NZ Syrah Tasting results

20 June 2024 (Cuisine magazine Issue 224)

There’s a lot of great syrah produced in New Zealand, so it’s high time you gave this varietal a go, suggests MARY-THÉRÈSE BLAIR.

I am personally a massive fan of NZ syrah and feel that it doesn’t get the credit it rightfully deserves. It holds a slightly underdog status when it comes up against our king of red – pinot noir. There is something about the mix of dark fruit, spice and smoke that is altogether beguiling. In a good year, syrah is bottled joy and what a great couple of vintages Aotearoa New Zealand had in both 2020 and 2021. Syrah from these vintages were described by head judge Simon Nunns as “wines for the ages” and it’s clear to see that the other judges were of similar minds and palates with nine of our Top Ten hailing from these vintages. The Top Ten is nothing less than an embarrassment of riches and we invite you to be bewitched by the very best syrah New Zealand has to offer.

Top 10 NZ Syrah

Craggy Range Syrah 2021 (Gimblett Gravels, Hawke’s Bay)

There are few New Zealand wine lovers who don’t know of Craggy Range. The brand, now 31 years young, was started by Terry and Mary Peabody in 1993. Their wish was to find a place so special from which remarkable wines would come that it would create not just a winery, but a legacy. After an initial search for land through Europe, the USA and Australia, the Peabodys found New Zealand, and more specifically Hawke’s Bay and yet more specifically again, the Gimblett Gravels sub-region. Here with help from locals and a belief that anything was possible, the legacy began with plantings of syrah, merlot and cabernet sauvignon in the wonderful alluvial soils for which this sub-region is famous.

Family patriarch Terry Peabody has cemented his commitment to family and to the Craggy Range legacy by establishing a 1000-year trust that ensures the winery can never be sold. That’s good news for lovers of fantastic New Zealand syrah as it’s clear that the Craggy Range brand, and the wines that put them on the map, aren’t going anywhere any time soon.

That’s great news when you taste a wine such as this which is deeply coloured and instantly attractive in the glass. The nose is plush and ripe with dark and purple fruit, hints of violets and subtle spice aromas. The palate is complex and well concentrated with bold tannins well integrated with plenty of weight, lovely harmony and fantastic length.