Dog Point Vineyard Marlborough Chardonnay 2023

The Mendoza clone of Chardonnay is a dominant force in the New Zealand wine scene: highly individual, full of flavour and ever ready with a saline, sea spray quality that gets the lips smacking. Dog Point does it better than many, capturing those qualities beautifully. Light gold hues. Flint, struck match, peach, nectarine, melon, citrus and citrus blossom aromas. A full, rich expression with French oak (10% new) playing an influence with its smoky toastiness, nougat nutty notes, and a second malolactic fermentation allowing the textural warmth of the wine to shine. A tightly coiled palate brings stone fruits, citrus, cardamom, bergamot and the kind of grippy tartness you get from sucking on grapefruit pith. All up, it’s one complex young Chardonnay with a long life ahead.

Jeni Port

Wine critic at Winepilot

Jeni Port is one of Australia’s top wine communicators. Based in Melbourne, Jeni created the first wine column in the (then) Sun News-Pictorial before moving over to The Age and becoming that paper’s longest-serving wine writer. Over the years she has written for most Australian wine magazines and these days calls WinePilot home. She is also a Tasting Panel member on the Halliday Wine Companion. She was named Wine Communicator of the Year and Legend of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival in 2014 and in 2018 Legend of the Vine. She is a founding board member of Australian Women In Wine and is the co-deputy chair of Australia’s Wine List of the Year Awards and China’s Wine List of the Year Awards.

Wine writer and critic