Why does New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc taste so different from Sancerre?

Climate, mostly. Marlborough's long, cool, sunny growing season lets the grape build intense aromatic compounds while holding on to high acidity, which produces that famous burst of passion fruit, gooseberry and cut grass. Sancerre, in France's Loire Valley, grows the same grape on limestone in a cooler and cloudier place, giving a leaner, flintier, more restrained wine. One grape, two accents.

What is the Gimblett Gravels?

A defined growing area within Hawke's Bay, unusual because its boundary follows a soil type rather than lines drawn on a map. The deep, stony gravel was left behind when the Ngaruroro River changed course after a flood in 1867. Those stones store heat and drain freely, which is why Bordeaux varieties and Syrah ripen there when they can struggle elsewhere in New Zealand.

Is New Zealand Pinot Noir like red Burgundy?

Related, but not the same. Both chase perfume and finesse rather than power. New Zealand versions usually give more upfront fruit, darker cherry and plum, and a rounder, riper feel, while red Burgundy leans earthier and more savoury. Central Otago makes the boldest examples and Martinborough the most structured. Good New Zealand Pinot Noir is worth judging on its own terms.

Does New Zealand make anything besides Sauvignon Blanc?

A great deal. Pinot Noir is the leading red and the country's strongest claim to greatness after Sauvignon Blanc. Hawke's Bay produces Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon blends alongside a fine, peppery Syrah. Chardonnay is excellent and often overlooked, Pinot Gris is widely planted, and Riesling, running from bone dry to lusciously sweet, has a small but devoted following.

New Zealand Wine: Regions, Grapes & Styles

New Zealand went from unknown to essential in about a decade. Marlborough's modern wine industry only began in 1973, when the first large commercial blocks went into the ground; a Scottish settler had grown grapes there a century earlier, but that vineyard was pulled out in the 1930s. The first Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc was released in 1979. When Cloudy Bay's 1985 vintage reached British and American critics, the world met a style of Sauvignon Blanc nobody had tasted before, so pungent and so precise that it changed what people expected the grape to smell like.

Geography did most of the work. New Zealand is two long, narrow islands, and almost no vineyard sits far from the sea. That means cool, maritime growing seasons, slow ripening and naturally high acidity, which is the crackle running through nearly every New Zealand wine. Central Otago, tucked inland behind mountains, is the exception, with a genuinely continental climate of hot days and cold nights. The industry is unusually modern in its habits too: almost all of the country's vineyard area is certified under the Sustainable Winegrowing New Zealand programme, and virtually every bottle is closed with a screwcap.

What New Zealand wine tastes like

If one word covers New Zealand wine, it is bright. Cool sea air keeps acidity high, so these wines taste lifted and fresh rather than heavy.

Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc is the famous version: an explosive nose of passion fruit, gooseberry, lime and freshly cut grass, then a dry, zippy palate. It is not subtle and is not trying to be. The Awatere Valley tends towards a leaner, more herbal take; the Wairau Valley towards a rounder, more tropical one.

The reds are gentler than you might expect. New Zealand Pinot Noir, from Central Otago, Martinborough and Marlborough, is fragrant and red-fruited, with darker cherry and a wild, herbal edge in Central Otago's warmer sites. Hawke's Bay makes the country's serious Bordeaux-style reds and its Syrah, which is peppery and floral rather than weighty.

Signature grapes of New Zealand

Sauvignon Blanc is the grape New Zealand made its own, and Marlborough grows the overwhelming majority of it. Pinot Noir is the leading red, thriving in Central Otago, in Martinborough and on Marlborough's heavier clay soils. Chardonnay is quietly excellent, especially from Hawke's Bay, and increasingly taut rather than buttery. Pinot Gris is the everyday white, pear-scented and softly textured. Riesling is a small planting but can be lovely, from bone dry to sweet. In Hawke's Bay, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah ripen properly on warm gravel soils.

Wine regions of New Zealand

Four New Zealand regions are covered here, and between them they explain the country. Marlborough, at the top of the South Island, is by far the largest and the home of Sauvignon Blanc. Central Otago, far south and inland, is the continental one: mountain-flanked, dramatic and devoted to Pinot Noir. Martinborough, a small district in the Wairarapa near Wellington, makes Pinot Noir of a more savoury, structured kind. Hawke's Bay, on the North Island's east coast, is the warmest, and the only one built around red Bordeaux varieties and Syrah.

Three New Zealand bottles to start with