"...significantly better than [...] Marlborough"

Here's a good start to the week from Gary Neale at Brightwater Vineyards in Nelson, New Zealand. Bubble Brothers are the Irish importers of Brightwater, listing not only their Sauvignon Blanc but Pinot Noir, Riesling (including an ice-wine) and Chardonnay.

I know that the clothes moths are beginning to get in to the cupboard where the fashion for New Zealand Sauvignons is kept: but they don't all taste the same; and the combination of currency rates in our favour and a surplus of fruit means that prices will probably start to fall, without a corresponding decline in quality; and anyway, don't come running to me for sympathy if your biggest woe is that you're fatigué(e) of the reliably vibrant, appetizing brilliance of NZ Sauvignon Blanc. Although Gary and the article are referring to a wine that we currently don't import - the premium bottling that goes by the name 'Lord Rutherford' - I think it is worth spreading the news that he is continuing to put Nelson, and his estate especially, very firmly on the wine map of New Zealand's very best.

In the last issue of Gourmet Traveller WINE magazine, the 2008 Brightwater Vineyards Lord Rutherford Sauvignon Blanc was listed as One of the Top 12 Sauvignon Blancs from New Zealand. In fact the only wines to score higher than the Brightwater were Cloudy Bay and Saint Clair Wairau Reserve. (Both significantly more expensive.) This is a great result! Especially when you consider that there are more than 500 Sauvignon Blancs made in New Zealand! Also 85% of New Zealands Sauvignon Blanc comes from Marlborough!

"Brightwater is a rapidly rising star in the Nelson wine scene..." "This was the leading wine in a region that fared significantly better than neighbouring Marlborough..."