Aronui Pinot Noir Nelson 2015 Mgnum Regional Wines

Commercial notes

A vibrant ruby red hue in the glass, this full bodied and expressive Pinot Noir from Nelson displays aromatic layers of dark fruit, bright cherry and subtle savoury oak. Richly textured and concentrated, the palate delivers intense dark berry fruits, black plum and subtle earthy notes. Elegantly balanced with smooth tannins and hints of spice, this generous wine leads to a long  and lingering finish.

The grapes for this single vineyard Nelson wine are hand-harvested before being brought over to our modern winery located in Marlborough’s Awatere Valley. Small parcels from individual blocks are lightly crushed and destemmed into stainless steel open-top fermenters with minimal pumping or handling. The must is then held cold for around 6 days before being slowly warmed and inoculated with yeast specifically selected by our winemaker. The fermentation is carried out at warm temperatures of up to 35°C, which combined with regular gentle cap plunging and an extended maturation period on skins allows for a gentle and balanced extraction of colour and tannin. At the end of the maturation period the wine is drained and pressed without settling directly to French oak barriques. Once the secondary malolactic fermentation is complete each batch is rigorously tasted and graded – with only the best barrels making it to the final blend. The resulting wine then cross-flow filtered without fining, before being bottled in late March 2016.

Grown entirely on our stunning Whenua Matua vineyard located in the Upper Moutere area of Nelson, the grapes for this wine gain their intensity and structure from the sites heavy clay soils and abundant sunshine. Our vineyard crew’s attentive canopy management–leaf plucking, shoot thinning, vine training aid in delivering clean, concentrated fruit to the winery at harvest. The 2014/2015 growing season in Nelson began with overall cooler conditions that lead to a cool and damp flowering period – resulting in a lighter crop throughout the blocks. Shot and fruit thinning was kept to a minimum due to the lighter crops, however some fruit thinning was required to avoid bunched overlapping and to improve air circulation and increase fruit exposure. Drought conditions from January meant that unlike most years we were unable to dry farm, and the blocks had to be irrigated. Meticulous vine management from our vineyard team kept the fruit disease-free, despite high pressure caused by mild night temperatures  and high dew fall.