Seifried Aotea Sauvignon Blanc 2020

The 2019 Aotea by the Seifried Family Sauvignon Blanc is pungent and tropical, showing notes of snow peas, white flesh peach and passionfruit. Gentle minerally acidity balances the fruit weight and concentration on the palate leaving lingering flavours of passionfruit and citrus.

The Rabbit Island vineyard is situated on a wide river flat. The soil is gravelly sandy loam, which marks the sites of Maori kumara beds (sweet potato) prior to European settlement in the early 1800’s. The Maori transferred and spread fine gravel and sand over the land to provide suitable soils for their kumara plantings. Scrub was burned to give ash and charcoal, which increased soil fertility and gave characteristic topsoil. This fertility is now considerably reduced due to modern farming. The soils are however, very sandy and free draining. The water table is relatively high ensuring adequate underground water. These vineyards are about 1.5 kilometres from the sea, which helps moderate summer temperatures.

Aromatic and fresh Sauvignon Blanc flavours were encouraged prior to vintage through careful canopy management. The fruit was de-stemmed and pressed immediately after harvest and a cool fermentation was initiated in stainless steel tanks to retain the clean, fresh aromatic fruit characters.