91 points - Wine Spectator
Vivid, generous style has enough restraint to keep the spice, lychee and apricot flavors reined into a nice, taut package, with extrodinarly well-balanced flavors. It's focused and long, with a slightly bitter bite on the finish, but the flavors are so generous it doesn't matter. Drink now through 2012. -HS
A $50 New Zealand Gewurztraminer?
That’s what we said when we were introduced to the idea of the 2003 Vinoptima Estate Gewurztraminer from Ormond in New Zealand. We were skeptical, to say the least.
But then we read in Decanter magazine, the U.K.’s preeminent wine publication, that none other than the esteemed Steven Spurrier (organizer of the famed Paris Tasting of 1976 that put California wine on the map) wrote in September, 2005, that 2003 Vinoptima Estate Gewurztraminer was his choice for “Best New World White.” He went on to say that the wine is “as good as top Alsace grand crus.”
Now it had our attention. And then we read in Wine Spectator (November 30, 2005) that Harvey Steiman recommended that the wine be drunk “now through 2012.” It really had our attention now.
So we finally had a chance to taste it this summer in San Francisco with a plate of Hog Island oysters. We try not to use superlatives too often, but this wine was literally (not figuratively) jaw-dropping. Those of us who tasted it for the first time stared at each other in disbelief. The wine was truly that amazing.
We could go on and on (and we will in coming weeks), but if you are an aficionado of wine at any level, you simply must try this wine, at least once.
