Hunter's Chardonnay offers incredibly good value for money. Complex, consistent and creamy, it has crisp notes that add great balance to such a modestly priced, affordable wine. 

Fermentation in 500 litre French oak puncheons with wild yeasts provides a smooth, full body to this impressive Chardonnay, which is made from grapes grown on three different vineyards in Marlborough.

Grapes in this wine were grown in Rapaura, Renwick and Omaka sub regions of Marlborough, all on vineyards that the Hunter's team has used for many years now. This wine is incredibly consistent in style with richly flavoursome citrus, nectarine and creamy flavour notes, supported by a firm backbone of acidity which adds drive, length and freshness to every succulent sip.

What the critics say

Aotearoa Regional Wine Competition, October 2021

4.5 stars ? Winestate Magazine, October 2021

Gold, 94/100 ? New World Wine Awards, August 2021

93/100 ? The Shout, Cameron Douglas MS, March 2021

Grown in the Riverpoint vineyard, the grapes are hand harvested and gently de-stemmed into upright wooden vessels sourced from France. Here the fruit sits and assimilates its origins and the surrounding resonance of the people who care for it. Nothing is added, nothing is taken away. No temperature control. No yeasts. Fermentation is assisted by careful mixing of the grapes and their juices.  Fermented 66 days on skins. When the vigour has settled, a cover is used to keep it warm and safe. At a later time the wine is pressed to barrels and left to sit until Spring, when it is then taken away from its sediments, settled and bottled, without filtration. Minimal sulphur is used throughout. Closed with natural cork, because we prefer it this way, it also adds to the five phenolics of taste, and upon opening makes a sound which is less heard of in these modern times and still makes your mouth water...

This wine is lifted with hints of cardamom, fennel seed and turmeric. A Moroccan market spice delight. There is an adoring complexity, rich with sweet sensations. It is cloudy from natural sediments, soft yet drying to the taste. It smells very clearly of its origins in terms of place and fruit. There is deep spice and almost waxy root crops, yet with lively pink rose aromas. It isn?t quaint, nor is it fruity. The taste is long and intense. Once opened, this wine will last, even improve, for a number of days afterwards, so take your time, savour and drink in moderation, with love and gratitude, but always remember to keep another bottle handy!

Wine from BioGro Certified Organic and Demeter Certified Biodynamic Grapes.

Bright, straw-yellow colour with an aromatic, intense nose with rose and honeyed notes. This is a dry Gewurztraminer with a crisp and zesty palate with great, lively acidity and notes of rose petal and steely minerality.

Off-dry in style. The nose shows notes of lychee, lemon zest, crushed lime leaf and rosewater. The palate is luscious and mouth-filling with a rich concentration, delicately balanced and exuding flavours of Turkish delight, lemon and spice. 

It's easy to see why this wine has won gold medals in its long history; the intense aromatic appeal of Turkish Delight and old fashioned red roses is deliciously well balanced in this lovely white from Marlborough.

Whitehaven Wines began life in 1994 as a romantic business for a couple of corporate escapees, Sue and Greg White, who had given up life in the rat race of Auckland for another kind of life aboard their yacht. When sailing around the country, they took shelter in the Marlborough Sounds from Pacific storms and fell in love with the region. An easy thing to do when harbouring in the spectacularly pristine waters of the Sounds. They decided to settle there on terra firma once more and try their hands at wine production, hiring a winemaker and beginning a business which has now been around for 26 years. Greg has sadly passed away now, leaving a legacy as well as his wife and daughter, Sam, to run the winery. Their winemaker is Peter Jackson.

If you're looking for an organically certified, approachable white wine, here's a lovely off dry wine with white fleshed pear flavours and a hint of fresh lemon captured in a soft, smooth, dry white for drinking now or soon rather than for cellaring. It will hold its own for two to three years and offers good value for money.

Saddleback is the second label of Central Otago winery Peregrine. The region offers a cool climate with large diurnal (day to night) shifts in temperature, perfect for developing the subtle flavours and keen acidity that really makes Pinot Gris tick. This superb value wine is made with grapes from the Bendigo (39%), Pisa (34%) and Gibbston (27%) sub regions of Central Otago, is 100% hand harvested and fermented on the lees for 2 months prior to blending and bottling. A dry Pinot Gris  with floral, citrus and ginger aromatics and flavours of fresh pear, apricot and stonefruit.

A rare delicious fresh white wine made from Petit Manseng, a French grape that originates in the south of France and makes characterful dry white wines such as this lively, aromatic wine - flavours of grapefruit and zesty ripe citrus make this a deliciously tasty wine. 

The father-daughter winemaking team, John and Beth Forrest, are champions of lesser known, outstandingly interesting grape varieties from around the world, including Petit Manning. 

Pronounced 'pet-eet man-seng'. Deliciousness in a bottle.

Palliser Pinot Gris has gentle soft qualities and is off dry in taste with flavours of candied ginger and mandarin peel leading to a light bodied wine with a spicy finish.

The grapes in this wine are a combination of three vineyards; Pencarrow Vineyard 60%, the organic Om Santi Vineyard 28% and the balance from the Clouston Vineyard. A portion was fermented in old French oak barrels to provide complexity. The two portions were  blended and aged for a a further two months on lees to gain texture before bottling. 

This West Auckland Pinot Gris is made in a dry style with grapes from Kumeu, fermented with indigenous yeasts and given extended maturation on lees following fermentation. This adds richness and complexity to this youthful white. It drinks well now and can hold for a couple of years as a good quality dry white. 

Kumeu River Wines began life as San Marino Wines in 1944 when Croatian immigrant couple, Mick and Katé Brajkovich, bought a small property with a vineyard on it. Their descendents now own and run Kumeu River Wines, which produces 250,000 bottles of wine annually from its owns 30 hectares of vineyards in Kumeu and from another 10 hectares, owned by local grape growers. 

Here's a Pinot Gris that tastes noticeably drier than many and is all about fresh pure, white fruit flavours of pear and peach. The refreshing acidity comes from the cooler climate grapes contained in the wine, which is made from a blend of grapes grown in three sub regions of Marlborough. The cool climate Awatere Valley has 73% with the remaining 17% from the Waihopai Valley and 10% from Kekerengu on the southern coast.

Grapes were fermented at cool temperatures to preserve fruit freshness and dry flavours. 

Residual sugar is 3.8 grams, making it dry in style - and also in flavour. 

The story of Astrolabe

Diversity, history and family ownership are among the reasons to try the outstanding range of wines from Astrolabe, which was founded in 1996 in Marlborough by winemaker Simon Waghorn and his partner in life and wine, Jane. 

Simon has forged a reputation for being one of New Zealand's most respected producers of aromatic white wines after winning an almost embarrassingly long string of awards for his Sauvignon Blancs. He has also forged a name for adventurously diverse winemaking - he produces dry flinty whites from the most southern vineyard in Marlborough at Kekerengu on the coast about an hour's drive south of Blenheim. He is the only winemaker to produce wines from here. 

He is also one of the few in this country to make Albarino, Chenin Blanc and a consistently outstanding range of wines from the organically certified hillside sloping site that is the Wrekin Vineyard in Marlborough. 

The winery remains family owned and is now run by two generations, including Simon and Jane as well as their adult daughters. 

White haven Pinot Gris is a versatile dry style with flavours of fresh nashi pears and crisp red apples, a medium body and textural finish. It's a great wine for everyday drinking with or without food, a lovely aperitif style to enjoy at lunch and early evening.

Whitehaven Wines began life in 1994 as a romantic business for a couple of corporate escapees, Sue and Greg White, who had given up life in the rat race of Auckland for another kind of life aboard their yacht. When sailing around the country, they took shelter in the Marlborough Sounds from Pacific storms and fell in love with the region. An easy thing to do when harbouring in the spectacularly pristine waters of the Sounds. They decided to settle there on terra firma once more and try their hands at wine production, hiring a winemaker and beginning a business which has now been around for 26 years. Greg has sadly passed away now, leaving a legacy as well as his wife and daughter, Sam, to run the winery.

Their winemaker is Peter Jackson.

Pinot Gris is the fourth most planted grape in New Zealand with a massive 2,488 hectares nationwide, inching slowly up to Chardonnay?s 3,167 hectares. It?s huge growth from just 157 hectares of Pinot Gris as recently as 2001, but numbers aside, it?s the taste that counts and Greywacke is next level in flavour. 

The grapes in this wine are from the Wrekin Terrace Vineyard in Brancott Valley where they grow on gravel over clay-loam soils, typical of the Southern Valleys in Marlborough. Three clones of Pinot Gris were all hand picked separately at high ripeness levels to provide rich fruity flavours in the finished wine, which was fermented in a combo of old French oak barriques and stainless steel tanks, all with wild yeasts to a finished 14.4% ABV with 10 grams per litre of residual sugar. 

Fresh, full bodied, off dry and intensely concentrated; one for the large glass on a decadent spring evening. 

Darling in name and in taste, this Marlborough Pinot Gris is made from certified organic grapes grown in Rapaura in Marlborough.

It's light bodied, off dry and tastes of fresh pears and white peach, offering a lovely easy white wine for newcomers to wine and for those who enjoy soft, smooth styles.