Craggy Range tells 2013 success story

Craggy Range has officially launched its top-end wines from the 2013 harvest, which the New Zealand producer hailed “the vintage of a generation”.

Craggy Range’s Aroha, Sophia and Le Sol expressions

“There’s always been a huge amount of belief about what we’re doing at Craggy Range and a huge amount of ambition,” remarked chief winemaker Matt Stafford as he introduced the winery’s Prestige Collection at an event in London this week. “We’ve always set out to get the best from the land and 2013 was the culmination of that for us.”

The success of 2013 is particularly marked by the challenges of the previous year, which Stafford acknowledged as “quite a poor season in Hawke’s Bay”. The diminished crop from its 2012 vintage meant that Craggy Range chose not to make its Le Sol Syrah or Sophia Bordeaux-style blend at all.

By contrast, Stafford recalled 2013’s frost-free conditions, warm December, and then “long, slow, even ripening period” with no serious rainfall right through to harvest. “What’s crucial for us is that while it’s officially classified as a warm year, the wines have some real elegance,” he observed.

At Craggy Range, which planted most of its vineyards in the late ‘90s and early 2000s, these favourable weather conditions combined with vines that are now reaching maturity.

“What we’ve seen with vine age is that the harvest period has become more condensed, especially with Pinot Noir,” remarked Stafford. “It’s gone from about three weeks to 7-10 days and we’ve seen the vines set naturally with less crop.”

In terms of adapting the winemaking to this maturation of the vineyard, he pointed to a slight shift in recent years for Craggy Range’s top end Pinot Noir, Aroha, which comes from its Te Muna Road property in Martinborough.

“We had that New World approach where we’d destem all the fruit, but at times the wines were becoming too full blown in style so as the vines have aged we’ve started doing some whole bunch [fermentation] – 40% this vintage – from about 2011 onwards,” Stafford outlined.

He stressed the particular importance of this whole bunch element in a vintage like 2013, suggesting that without this component “we would have had a lot of very plush Pinot Noir, which would have affected the purity of the fruit.”

Despite this shift, Stafford insisted that it was important to balance the effect of whole bunch fermentation. “The big trend at the moment in New Zealand is whole bunch and everyone’s getting very excited by that stemmy character, which actually isn’t very nice when you get it on the palate,” he remarked. “What we’re chasing is floral lift and then textured drive on the finish.”

Considering this trend in the context of Syrah, Stafford commented: “There’s a lot of chat about whole bunch with Syrah as well, but we’ve been slower to look at that. We’re starting to see our stems becoming stronger with age, so we’ve said we won’t do any whole bunch until the vines are at least 15 years old.”

Highlighting the success of 2013 from the point of view of Syrah, most notably Craggy Range’s top end expression Le Sol, Stafford noted that its genesis was not entirely stress free.

“With Le Sol everything was tracking two months behind,” he recalled of the wine’s evolution in barrel, joking: “There was a lot of hair loss.” Now however, Stafford confirmed: “We’re starting to see more complex notes coming through.” Above all, he remarked: “For me the finesse of the tannins is exciting. We’ve always been critical that with Hawke’s Bay Syrah the tannins can be a bit boney, but these are nice and dusty.”

Again, he noted the benefits of maturing vineyards for further boosting quality in 2013, saying: “The biggest impact with vine age has been bunch size and berry size. Syrah can plump up a lot, then dehydrate and ‘bag’. With age that hasn’t happened because the berries are smaller; in 2013 we didn’t see any bagging.”

Turning to one of Hawke’s Bay’s most important calling cards, Stafford observed: “2013 was an exceptional year for Merlot. The perfume we get from Gimblett Gravels is extraordinary, but the tannins are never too plush so there’s always a lovely austere feel.”

He drew a stylistic parallel between Craggy Range’s two top Hawke’s Bay expressions, saying: “For me what’s exciting about Le Sol and Sophia in 2013 is the youthful feel of the wines. When you can achieve low total acidity at a low pH it’s pretty exciting – that’s what Bordeaux does so well. Warmer climate wines tend to be soft and supple, and that’s the higher pH.”

Comparing the 2013 vintage with previous highly acclaimed Hawke’s Bay years such as 2009, Stafford concluded: “When I look back at previous great Hawke’s Bay vintages they’ve always been quite tough, a little over-extracted. What’s lovely about 2013 is that there’s an elegance to the wines.”