Viticulture

Staete Landt Estate is set in the heart of Marlborough’s “Golden Mile” of Rapaura. With four individual parcels of Chardonnay spread over clay-ish and stonier soils, we have the luxury of distinct flavour profiles that provide our wine with complexity and elegance.
Vintage of 2008 followed a remarkably settled fruiting season. With plenty of rain in the winter of 2007, the vines burst into life well hydrated and the following months of warm and dry conditions provided well set, full bunches. So full that we heavily thinned the crop over the summer months to ensure we retained our characteristic fruit flavours. Summer provided the region with some very hot days, which helped speed up the ripening process. As a result vintage began a little earlier than in previous years, but allowed us to handpick the fruit at optimum ripeness, with no major pressure of rainfal or anything else.

The four parcels of Staete Landt Chardonnay comprise two different clones; clone 95 and clone 15, planted on three different rootstocks: Riapria Gloire, 101-14 and Schwarzmann. Each clone and rootstock combination is mirrored on different soil types, within the Estate Vineyard, with each parcel treated individually throughout the growing season.

Harvest Dates: 20 March – 28 March 2008
Brix: 24.1 – 24.7

Winemaking

We hand picked all our Chardonnay grapes and whole bunch pressed which ensured we had only the finest most delicate juice. This was briefly settled before being racked straight to barrels to undergo fermentation. The Chardonnay fermented in a mixture of 20% new French Oak and 80% older French oak barrels. We used indigenous yeast for fermentation in half the wine, which has added complexity and that extra-mouth feel to the wine. Following alcoholic fermentation the barrels were stirred regularly until completion of the secondary malolactic fermentation. The wine aged on lees until it was eventually racked in August 2009. In total the Chardonnay has aged in barrels for a total of 18 months. After the final racking the different component wines were blended back together, lightly fined and then kept in tank to clarify, just prior to bottling.

Wine Analysis

Alcohol: 14%; Acidity: 6.2g/L; pH: 3.2; Sugar: 1.8g/L

Tasting Note

Staete Landt Chardonnay is one of the best kept secrets of the Estate: full and round yet stylish, great texture and length, this wine shows the perfect balance between fruit, acidity and elegant oak integration.

A whiff of sea breeze and summer stone fruit on the nose, white peaches & cream, hazelnuts on the palate with a mineral aftertaste that lingers on. A truly great wine with a strong personality and a European elegance, showing the unique cool climate Marlborough vibrance.