Misha's Vineyard

Hong Kong International Wine & Spirit Fair

Misha’s Vineyard Wines was placed with some amazing company at the Hong Kong Wine & Spirit Fair held at the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre from November 4th to November 6th. Our Hong Kong distributor – Jebsen Fine Wines – had secured a prime hall-entry location for their stunning booth which featured just 8 brands including Bollinger, Robert Mondavi, Marchesi de’ Frescabaldi, Penfolds, Chateau d’Esclans and of course Misha’s Vineyard.

The event attracted over 700 exhibitors with the many thousands of attendees on the two trade days and one public day coming from across the globe. Many of the visitors were from mainland China where wine consumption and education in both old world and new world wines is on a rapid rise. The very high level of interest in the range of Misha’s Vineyard wines kept the Jebsen team and ourselves pouring wines and talking about our vineyard throughout the three days and resulted in quite a number of future placements with fine dining restaurants.

In conjunction with the fair, Jebsen Fine Wines had arranged several wine dinners and special customer tastings of the wines. Our special dinner with the WineNow magazine guests hosted by well known Hong Kong wine personality Mr Lau Chi Su, paired Bollinger Special Curvee, Chateau d’Esclans Rosé, Misha’s Vineyard Pinot Noir, Robert Mondavi Cabernet Sauvignon, Luce Toscana IGT and Penfolds Grange with an array of Chinese dishes. (See our Food and Wine blog for the menu)

Thanks to the wonderful team from Jebsen Fine Wines. Such professional organization and support made this event a real success for Misha’s Vineyard Wines.

Tags: Bollinger, Hong Kong, Hong Kong International Wine & Spirit Fair, Jebsen Fine Wines, Misha Wilkinson, mishas vineyard, pinot noir, Wine Distributor, WineNow

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Vineyard manager Rich William’s October report.

Well, what a CRACKING start to the season!!

October has brought about unseasonably hot temperatures with less wind and less rain than normal. All this has meant the vines are enjoying some rapid shoot growth of which I have only imagined.

We couldn’t have hoped for more of a perfect start to the year. While our budburst was a week later than normal, we are well and truly ahead of where we were this time last year. The word on the street is that we’ve begun an El Nino weather circle and things certainly seem different.

We have had an unusually consistent bud break giving even growth on both apically and basally inclined positions. Hot weather has accelerated growth and on some days it seemed you could watch things growing. Over Labour weekend alone they must have surely doubled in size. This has meant we have been applying back to back sulphur sprays to keep up with the migration of erinose mite and to hinder the occurrence of powdery mildew and I am pleased with how well our new Hardi Zenit sprayer is performing.

On the flip side things are getting really busy. I would not have predicted that all our work would begin this fast and that we would be doing all the early season work at once! Our work is cut out to keep up or the even growth is going to give way to unevenness if we don’t act fast. We are progressing steadily shoot thinning through the young vines in the House Block and are due to finish the Pinot Noir by tomorrow. Shoots are already around 30 cm long and getting to the point where we need to be also doing our first wire lift to support the growth. While it is important to have shoots safely tucked up, it is also of high importance to ensure a well measured canopy by thinning to let light penetrate to the interior of the canopy reducing disease incidence and ensuring we have the best results during flowering.

At first glance already bunch size looks remarkably large and with a lot of 3rds and bunch shoulders. Bunch proximity is situated on the 3rd and 4th leaf and research points to larger bunch size the closer they are to the base of the shoot. Last year bunches were mainly situated around the 4th and 5th leaf and bunch size was reasonably small. So we will be looking closely at how our yields develop over the coming months and into flowering.

Great to meet Stephen Brook last week and show him the around the vineyard. We managed to find a nice spot in Ah Foo’s hut for a few glasses of wine and white bait patties on the barbie. Rudy from Quartz Reef was able to join us for a bit before whisking Stephen away for another adventure around the Bendigo area before he was off up to the Air NZ awards to preside the judging panel with our very own Mr Masters.

So it seems there is a bit of work ahead and less time relaxing with wine and patties…  Rich

Tags: central otago, central otago pinot, Central Otago Pinot Noir, mishas vineyard, pinot noir, Rich Williams

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Misha and Andy recently had the pleasure of training almost 50 of the staff at Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands on New Zealand wines, Central Otago region and on our Misha’s Vineyard Pinot Noir. “It is always such a great experience to be able to talk directly to the staff who will be recommending and pouring the wines to guests in great establishments like this $6.5b casino, restaurant, bar and entertainment complex” said Misha.

Misha’s Vineyard Pinot Noir and Sauvignon Blanc are served at the Premier Lounge – where the high rollers of the world come to gamble huge sums. A recent Channel News Asia special program on the planning and the development of Marina Bay Sands called “Paradise in the Sky”, showed Christine Kaelbel-Sheares, Director of Piaza, VIP F & B introducing the features of the premier lounge and the selection of premium wines. This program provided great exposure to the Misha’s brand and New Zealand Pinot Noir across Asia. Misha’s Vineyard wines are also served in several other fantastic bars and restaurants in the complex.

This staff training session at the Marina Bay Sands follows similar sessions done at several other premium hotels and restaurants across Asia where Misha and Andy have been able to take management, bar and serving staff through a one hour training program which introduces the uniqueness of New Zealand wines, provides some background on the region of Central Otago, tells the stories of Misha’s Vineyard and then goes through a tasting of the wines. Much of the training material is supplied by New Zealand Winegrowers and shows both the focus on quality in New Zealand as well as the iconic environment that the wines are produced in. “You can taste New Zealand’s spectacular scenery and pure air in the wines” says Andy in his introduction of the presentation.

“The reception to this training has been wonderful” says Misha. “All of the places where we have conducted training have asked if we can come back on a regular basis to provide follow on training to new staff”.

Tags: Andy Wilkinson, central otago, central otago pinot, Central Otago Pinot Noir, Marina Bay Sands, Misha, Misha Wilkinson, mishas vineyard, new zealand wine, New Zealand Winegrowers, pinot noir

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Establishing a Misha’s Vineyard footprint in key parts of the world is the top priority this year for the sales and marketing department (aka Andy and me!). We have just announced our second distributor in Australia, Estate Wine Distributors. We’re absolutely delighted because Peter Papanikitas has an experienced team who are focussed on the restaurant sector in Sydney, Canberra, Brisbane, and Cairns. And we have completed our first shipment to South Korea through our agent there and the wine will go into restaurants. We’re happy to have been able appoint seven distributors in seven markets and hoping to increase that number by the end of the year.

We have just spent a week in the UK and attended the New Zealand Summer New Release Tasting at NZ House on the Haymarket. The two consecutive trade tasting days were held in the Penthouse of New Zealand house which had panoramic views across London. It was a spectacular place for a wine tasting and our wines received lots of positive comments. We also met with potential distributors and visited a few great dining spots including The Providores (www.theprovidores.co.uk/ and The Modern Pantry www.themodernpantry.co.uk/)
– and oddly enough they both have NZ-focussed wine lists! Also went to a very fab restaurant that’s casual but cool just near Charring Cross called Terroirs (www.terroirswinebar.com/). I had an amazing dish of braised rabbit on polenta and washed it down with 2007 Barbera ‘Ronco Malo’ produced by Vittorio Bera from Piemonte – fab!

Some really exciting news is that three of our wines have been selected for the 2010 Tri Nations Wine Challenge this year: Misha’s Vineyard Limelight Riesling 2009, Misha’s Vineyard Dress Circle Pinot Gris 2009 and Misha’s Vineyard Verismo Pinot Noir 2008. The latter is our Reserve Pinot which we have just released so it’s very flattering that it’s been chosen as one of the top Pinot Noirs to represent New Zealand competing against the best of Australia and South Africa.

Early in July I’m off to Tokyo for just a few days for the NZ Trade Tasting event at the Ritz Carlton along with some trade activities including a wine tasting at the glamorous Isetan store in Shinjuku which has the most beautiful fine wine section that includes a gated cellar! And then we’re off to the US to attend a fantastic event called the International Pinot Noir Celebration and to hopefully find a distributor for our wines there. Will keep you posted!

Misha

Tags: Estate Wine Distributors, Misha, Misha Wilkinson, mishas vineyard, new zealand wine, Pinot Gris, pinot noir, The Modern Pantry, The Providores, Tri Nations Wine, Verismo, Wine Distributor

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New Wine Business Magazine article from Misha

Misha’s recent article in Wine Business Magazine entitled “Pinot Noir – Fashion or Fad”, received some great interest from around the world. The article is largely based around the Pinot Noir 2010 event which was held in Wellington, New Zealand in February 2010. The event attracted Pinot Noir lovers globally for a four-day celebration of all things Pinot! Pinot Noir is now New Zealand’s second most exported varietal and New Zealand is clearly positioned as producing some of the world’s best!

Download PDF

To subscribe to WBM – click here

Tags: Misha, mishas vineyard, pinot noir, Pinot Noir 2010, Wine Business Monthly

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An update from Andy:
At the end of week two of harvest we are about half way with 54 tonnes of grapes now in the winery for processing. These have not been full work weeks as Olly carefully selects sections of the vineyard that are just right for picking and we anticipate about 6 days more picking spread over the next two weeks to complete the season. At this stage all of the Gewurtztraminer and Sauvignon Blanc is picked, we are part way throught the Riesling and have taken some sections of Pinot Noir. The remaining Riesling, all of the Pinot Gris and most of the Pinot Noir is still enjoying a warm Autumn. The canopy on the vines in most of the vineyard has held up well this year so flavours continue to develop in the fruit. Picking by taste and not by brix and acid numbers is to me a wonderful expression of art rather than science.

Our harvest crew has been fantastic and although some of our French workers have left to return home, and Ken – from China – has also moved on – we are looking forward to some great new crew joining the team next week. I’ve been working with the team each day driving tractors and running buckets – and my aches and pains are testimony to the steepness of the slopes and heavy buckets. We are really thankful to the effort our whole team, both permanent staff and casuals, have been putting in and appreciate their care and attention to picking. Our focus on quality has been applied by every member of the team.

The word from the winery is wow! They are really delighted with the quality of fruit coming in and even my limited palate is enjoying the wide range of tropical and berry flavours from the early stages of juice and ferments. The most frustrating part is now waiting until late 2011 or early 2012 before the Pinot Noir from this vintage gets released!

Tags: central otago, Gewurztraminer, Harvest, mishas vineyard, Olly Masters, Pinot Gris, pinot noir, Riesling

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An update from Robin Dicey – Consulting Viticulturalist

Véraison is not far off now that heat has now finally arrived – so an increase in irrigation is warranted. The time for stress is probably over – and we also need to think a bit about the following season as well. We only found a few bunches showing signs of véraison on the 3rd February when these pictures were taken but by and large I think the rest of the vineyard will just be starting to show a bit more colour from about mid month.
Given the problems of this challenging season, I am now quite relaxed about the balance in the canopy versus crop. It is as if the vines sensed that what lay ahead was going to be difficult, and to try to carry a heavy load was not going to be a great plan. There is not a great deal of thinning required – just a little ‘adjustment’ here and there. But overall things are looking great on the vineyard.

Tags: central otago pinot, misha's, mishas vineyard, pinot noir, Robin Dicey

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An update from Olly Masters – Winemaker

Well that was a busy week! Firstly we had the Pinot Noir 2010 Conference in Wellington from which I think all the New Zealand Pinot Noir producers should come away positive and pleased! The strong line-up of international media and trade provided good recognition of New Zealand’s overall wine quality and they also conveyed their views of increasing export demand for New Zealand Pinot. I then followed the Pinot event with the Nelson Aromatics Symposium where the guest speaker was Ernst Loosen, of the famous German Estate, Dr Loosen. Now suddenly, and not surprisingly, all I want to drink this week is beer!

On the weekend prior to these events I looked at all our Misha’s Vineyard 2009 Pinot ferments with a view to overall quality and blending decisions, with the wines having just been sulphured post the completion of malo. Overall I was very happy, and once again the quality is solid enough for us to release a small amount of our reserve – Verismo. And we also have a small volume which we will use for the entry-level Impromptu.

I also opened up bottles of the ‘08 Pinot Noirs as comparisons and the 09’s were very similar in inherent quality offered. The ‘08 Impromptu has opened up with some nice bramble, roast and truffle oil notes showing, the ‘08 High Note is showing lovely dark sweet fruit and a gentle palate, whilst the Verismo, although extremely impressive, is still a little locked up, but we’re still some months away from its anticipated release!

Tags: central otago, Misha, mishas vineyard, Olly Masters, pinot noir

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Good progress was made with bud rubbing and with the additional help of the Vanuatuan crew we’re now into bunch removal. We’re removing bunches from the short shoots starting first in the Riesling where there are quite a few 3rd and 4th bunches mainly on the less vigorous parts and we’ve also needed to do a partial lateral think through the centre of the block in order to see into the interior. The vines are coming up really well and putting our shoot/fruit ration back into balance. So far there are some quite small bunches in places and so we’re expecting lighter crops across the board this season. Rich..

Wind effects. The last few reports seem to have been an unending litany of woe concerning weather related opprobrium, recently including a degree of pluviality as well. The Pinot Gris in the Dress Circle has particularly seen the impact of the wind and so we’ve had to remove more bunches off short canes than usual – but it’s what is needed. Once again there is a big difference in sheltered versus unsheltered rows. At this stage we are performing a bunch removal exercise and not a thinning exercise. We would look further into establishing more planting shelter. The good news was today there was no wind and it was a glorious morning!
• The vines up on the Top Block are looking in good shape, if a bit small, which is no bad thing.
• The hoped-for and expected growth spurt in the young vines has not really eventuated – at least not yet. It may still come.
• The evening-up of the bunches through removal of the shoulders has gone pretty well, and the crop should come in a lot a more uniform condition.

The difficulties of the season with the relentless winds are making it tough for the vines. But against all this bunch conformation looks excellent. Since we had virtually no ‘stuck’ caps, fruit set has been good and berry shatter virtually non-existent. The result is that we are seeing bunch closure with berries much smaller than usual. If the seeds have been well fertilized this could lead to some interesting times in a few weeks as the berries achieve their optimum size. Robin

Notes to decipher Robin’s report!
Opprobrium: 1. the disgrace or the reproach incurred by conduct considered outrageously shameful; infamy.
Pluviality: 1. of or pertaining to rain, esp. much rain; rainy.

Tags: misha's, mishas vineyard, pinot noir, Rich Williams, Robin Dicey

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Hi all – Rich here. Just an update on how the vineyard is progressing at the moment.

I have been doing some colouring in – see attached map of bud-break for a better understanding of how the vineyard is progressing. Red means more advanced, yellow is less advanced and shoot size was really just an estimation. It may not be that easy to see here but it’s really good at full size!

These advanced areas seem to be mainly in respect of soil temperature (though no measurements taken) which are primarily around rises in the contours of the land. The earliest bud push was observed in the Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling and Gewürtz (Fruit Bowl), Pinot Gris (Dress Circle) and in the Pinot Noir (House Block) and generally the cane pruned vines in the mid-section of the vineyard.

We had a number of days during the earlier part of the week where air temperatures were a lot colder than normal, which slowed growth considerably and caused leaves to turn yellow and rough as a ‘badgers backside’. Now that the sun is out, things are back to the usual pace. I have noticed over the last couple of days the growth of the early pushers has slowed and overall the growth is evening up. The Lakefront block of Pinot Noir has started to crank up (especially the well-pruned ones!) which is probably the early signs of vigour.

Robin has given the go ahead to start shoot thinning the young Pinot Noir and Sav Blanc when we feel the need. I have done a small amount of thinning (5 rows) in the young Pinot Noir already and all seems straight forward and it will give them some good advance if worked on early. The young Riesling is further behind the Pinot Noir so it can be done at a later stage. Then we can move over and start attacking the Ski Slope. We still have plenty of time up our sleeves so no real pressure to get underway.

We are getting some good replies to the ad for vineyard staff in the Bulletin. Health and safety information is all prepared in folder for the viewing pleasure of future Misha’s vineyard workers. A great read!

Anyway, everything is sorted here at Ground Control. (Rich)

Tags: central otago, central otago pinot, Misha, misha's, mishas vineyard, pinot noir

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