In the 1970s, Montana in Marlborough started producing wines which were labelled by year of production (vintage) and grape variety (in the style of wine producers in Australia). The first production of a Sauvignon Blanc of great note appears to have occurred in 1977. Also produced in that year were superior quality wines of Muller Thurgau, Riesling and Pinotage.
New Zealand is home to what many wine critics consider the world’s best Sauvignon Blanc. Oz Clarke, a well known British wine critic wrote in the 1990s that New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc was "arguably the best in the world" (Rachman). Historically, Sauvignon Blanc has been used in many French regions in both AOC and Vin de Pays wine. The most famous had been France’s Sancerre. It is also the grape used to make Pouilly Fumé.
New Zealand Food & Wine Matching Dinner with Mike Stewart
Friday 23rd March
Wine making and vine growing go back to
colonial
times in New Zealand. British Resident and keen oenologist James Busby
was, as early as 1836, attempting to produce wine at his land in Waitangi.
In 1851 New Zealand's oldest existing vineyard was established by the Roman
Catholic church on land in Hawke's Bay. Due to economic (the importance of
animal agriculture and the protein export industry), legislative (prohibition
and the temperance) and cultural factors (the
overwhelming predominance of beer and spirit drinking British immigrants), wine was for many years a
marginal activity in terms of economic importance. Dalmatian
immigrants arriving in New Zealand at the end of the nineteenth and beginning
of the twentieth century brought with them viticultural
knowledge and planted vineyards in West and North Auckland. Typically, their vineyards
produced sherry
and port
for the palates of New Zealanders of the time, and table wine
for their own community.
Mike Stewart will be selcting and presenting tonights wines and Chef will offer a well balanced menu using the best available British produce to deliver a well matched meal.
Dinner commences at 7.30pm and the bar and lounge are available from 7pm.
Accommodation, appetizer and three course dinner, breakfast
and all dinner wines, for two persons sharing:
Standard Room £198 Intermediate Room £210
Lake View Standard £230 Lake View Superior £250
Non-resident spaces are very limited at £55 per person for the dinner
