First Oregon, and now the world. As we said in a piece not long ago about l’Envoye’s exciting new bottlings from Beaujolais, the folks at Maison L’Envoyé started with a lot of promise and only seem to be broadening their impact and their sphere of influence. Given the players involved, that really wasn’t a big surprise. Their name, Maison L’Envoye, loosely translated means ‘House of the Messenger’. Their mission is a bit wordy, “Minimalist Burgundian winemaking fostered in the Côte d’Or crossing the Pacific to meet generational farming on the diverse and unique soils of Oregon’s Willamette Valley.” Catchy, huh? The ‘message’ itself seems to be much simpler…well conceived, well-made, well priced wines wherever they go.
The ‘dream team’ continues to spread its wings to a number of far flung spots. Mark Tarlov, who created Evening Land, raised a few eyebrows in the northwest when he purchased the vaunted Seven Springs Vineyard, left that enterprise in 2012 to create this project. He partnered with none other than Louis-Michel Liger-Belair, Burgundy winemaker extraordinaire, producer of extremely rare bottlings from the Cote d’Or. Rounding out the group is Max Marriott, certainly the least ‘famous’ of the group, but an Aussie with quite a resume including Louis-Michel in Burgundy as well as top producers in New Zealand, Tasmania, Germany and at Cristom (one of our personal favorites from Oregon).
With this kind of winemaking pedigree, one might expect that the thrust would be yet another high end project, yet the wines are pretty consistently value priced. Apparently with all that time to burn during winter in the Northern Hemisphere, they decided to explore a couple locations far to the south. In both Tasmania and Central Otago, they work with a single vineyard, each family owned and farmed, that are outstanding examples of ‘purely expressed’, coole- climate Pinot Noir. In areas where the wines can sometimes be overtly nervy, their efforts have a pleasing tender edge to the expressive ripe fruit.
Our focus today is the Kiwi version from what we believe is the best spot for Pinot in New Zealand, Central Otago. A little further inland, and a little bit warmer, here Pinot Noir expresses the distinctive character of New Zealand, but with a layer of ripe, glossy fruit up front to give it immediate appeal. Yes the classic notes of tea, laurel, and savory spice are all part of the equation, but the insistent cherry fruit core pulls it all together and the tender edge to the mid-palate gives it a user-friendly feel that makes it a finer, if cooler-edged choice for current consumption.
It walks the line nicely at 13.9% alcohol level, clearly showing there is plenty of ripeness, but still coming in under that 14% ‘hard cap’ that is a point of contention for some wine drinkers. Tasty, bright and light on its feet, this is a deft glassful of Pinot Noir. While we are certainly happy to support our words with a 91 point score from Wine Advocate, we don’t necessarily agree with some of the specific statements in the review.
From erobertparker.com writer Joe Czerwinski, who is also the Rhone reviewer, “The 2017 Central Otago Pinot Noir comes out of the chute a bit green and stemmy (it’s 50% whole cluster). It clearly needs a year or two to settle down and integrate that element with the bold cherry fruit, but I have little doubt that those components will come together in time, resulting in a wine that’s substantially more attractive than it is currently. It’s medium to full-bodied, with ample ripeness, silky tannins and solid length on the finish, all of which augur well for the future. It’s made at Giant Steps in the Yarra Valley (Australia).”
We contend that whatever transformation Czerwinski expected to happen over time, must have happened already (even though the review is only from July, 2019). We experienced none of the ‘kiwi green’ notes described in the first sentence, and found this wine fresh, engaging and pretty darn likeable out of the gate, or we wouldn’t be writing this piece. At $24.98, it is a well performing, food friendly Pinot that should find a receptive audience in general and be particularly appealing to fans of the distinctive New Zealand genre.
Nicely done.