Dog Point Sauvignon Blanc 2024

Reviews

Erin Larkin, Robert Parker's Wine Advocate: 95/100. The 2024 Sauvignon Blanc leads with a distinct nose of freshly picked curry leaf, crushed sea shells, lemon zest, asphalt, mustard seed, dried coriander/coriander seed and white flesh orchard fruit. This is powerfully fruited, has great energy and drive and, unsurprisingly, offers great pleasure and satisfying drinking. This is a very smart, savory wine here.

Cameron Douglas MS: 94/100. An excellent bouquet and palate with scents and flavours of citrus and nettles, fresh sage and grapefruit, apple and a layer of green passionfruit fresh lychee nut. Crisp and dry with plenty of mouthfeel, saline qualities and freshness. Some time on lees adds to the texture and length. Delicious, fresh, balanced and well made. Best drinking from day of purchase through 2029.

Stephen Wong MW (The Real Review): 94/100 & Wine of the Week. An absolute stand-out wine from the 2024 vintage, this has all of the telltale Dog Point flinty reduction which seems to mark all of their wines. This is made from Dog Point’s organic parcels and is a wine which has a good track record of ageing in the mid-term. Distinctive reduction on the nose leads to quite a structured palate with layered complexity over a ripe core of apple. Young, tight and with very good concentration, this is classic, displaying lovely balance and length on the pure, precise finish where a touch of minerality emerges. Ageing: now to 2028.

James Suckling (JamesSuckling.com): 93/100. This is excellent, as always, showing flint, sliced lemons and fresh green melon. Some Thai basil too. Medium body, crisp acidity and lots of fruit at the end but with focus and tension. Drink now.

Christina Pickard, Wine Enthusiast: 93/100. Dog Point's whites are known for their distinctive flinty, reductive characters that sometimes go too far. But lately, this producer has reined it in, striking the perfect balance so that the white peach and guava fruit shine, too. There's chalky, pithy textural components and a tautness that suggests a happy few years of aging. If drinking now, a little aeration in glass won't hurt.

Michael Cooper: 5 stars.  The youthful 2024 has all the signs of a top vintage. Bright, light lemon/ green, it is mouthfilling, sweet-fruited and tightly structured, with deep, vigorous, passionfruit/lime flavours, good acid spine and a dry, sustained finish.

Tasting Note

Pure and bright perfume with an array of citrus covering grapefruit, lemon, lime and mandarin. Subtle gravelly tones help to weave another layer of complexity around the fruit. Juicy and fresh upfront, the riper fruit spectrum of stone fruit opens and offers an intense generosity of flavour. It follows through the mid-palate with a refreshing and quenching finish of crystalline acidity.

Aromas and flavours:

Additional information

Type: White wine

Grape varial: 100% Sauvignon Blanc

Food match: Fresh, simple seafood dishes especially oysters. Smoked kahawai with green olive and sweet basil. Also compliments goat cheese well. Try a goat cheese summer salad.

Vineyard location: Wairau Valley, Marlborough, New Zealand

Soil type: Silty-clay loams, some parcels with gravels interspersed.

Vintage: A typical start to the season with a moderately dry, mild winter and spring, with budburst underway in the first week of October, and only a few minor frost events occurring after that. Flowering occurred in early to mid-December during a period of changeable conditions which managed to temper yields. December settled into dry warm weather creating exceptional growing conditions into late autumn. The absence of rain with only 32mm falling over summer, broke the drought record which has stood for the last 94 years. Idyllic high sunshine hours, and classic cool overnight temperatures in Autumn ensured acidity levels were preserved and the fruit retained freshness. A vintage to remember.

Winemaking: Dog Point's version of the classic aromatic Marlborough style of Sauvignon Blanc. Hand picked and whole bunch pressing of fruit prior to cold settling then fermentation. 85% of this wine is fermented using indigenous yeasts. The wine is aged for 4 months in stainless steel tanks then bottled without fining.

Alcohol: 13.5% vol

Total acidity: 7.4 g/l

Bottle size: 0.75l

Notice: contains sulphites

Cellaring potential: until 2028+

Ingredients: Grapes, preservatives and antioxidants: potassium metabisulphite (sulfites). Bottled in a protective atmosphere..

Closure: Screwcap

Produced and bottled by: Dog Point Vineyards Ltd, PO Box 52, Renwick, Marlborough, New Zealand

Distributor: vinabonus GmbH, Simmedenweg 40, 34134 Kassel, Germany

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