Score: 87/100
The Hawke’s Bay region of New Zealand North Island is most famous for producing quality wines out of French grape varieties, mainly Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Chardonnay, and Sauvignon Blanc.
But Church Road Winery keeps experimenting, planting other grape varieties in their vineyards in order to find the ones that would potentially find themselves suited to the local terroir. Out of the many they have tried to make good wines with, only a few have produced a good enough result to be bottled and released under the CRW label. Marzemino is one of them. Church Road has also found that the most famous grape variety: Tempranillo, is giving great results. See full tasting notes of Church Road Mc Donald Series Tempranillo.
Marzemino is originally an Italian red wine grape variety mainly grown in the Northern region of Trentino-Alto-Adige. Would it have found a new home in the Church Road vineyards of the Hawkes Bay region?
How good is Church Road’s version of the Northern Italian Marzemino?
As always, the answer is in the tasting notes:
Appearance: very dark, very dark red, ‘bloody’ I’m tempted to say!
Nose: Astonishingly rich and appealing nose of dark and juicy blackberry, freshly dried plum helped by the right amount of pudding spices and oak aromas (vanilla, licorice, cinnamon, hazelnut). It’s a tempting hot Christmas pudding straight out of the oven, covered with fresh sweet dark berry coulis. Just so appetizing, you want to dig in!
Gripping fruit tannins but well softened by plenty of fine oak tannins. Medium + body with a slight lack of acidity to perfectly balance. Spices, marzipan, and oak dominant on the palate.
Overall: a very juicy wine that delivers plenty of richness: lots of spices and ripe fruit characters in a rich tannic structure.
Drinking window: Give it a year to soften up and drink within 5 years.
Food pairing: I can see this wine being absolutely perfect with rich creamy (Italian) cheeses: gorgonzola or taleggio.
Find out more about Church Road winery and their wines on Church Road Winery profile.
Please let me know your thoughts