Joelle Thomson

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Digging the dirt on a new cellar door

Architectural drawing of the new Nga Waka cellar door from Vicky Read at Aspect Architecture...

Friday wine with Dom Maxwell of Greystone

Here is Dom Maxwell’s story. Bored at his desk job and in love with being outside led Dom Maxwell to his consider a career in winemaking because he was kindling the first flames of his passion for wine, when living in the UK. He is now the winemaker at Greystone Winery in North Canterbury, a place he began work in October 2004, initially in the vineyards there. Prior to that, he studied a one year post graduate  viticulture and oenology degree at Lincoln University. His first degree, s...

Woman in wine, Jane Hunter…

She took over Hunter’s Wines as owner and managing director in 1987 after the untimely death of her husband Ernie, who founded the winery in 1978; early days for quality wine in this country. Prior to her role at Hunter’s Wines, Jane was head of viticulture at Montana Wines. She has was born in South Australia and has a degree in Agricultural Science from the University of Adelaide. Her leadership and ownership of Hunter’s Wines has seen the company grow to at least five times its origi...

Woman in wine, Celia Hay

Celia Hay is the founder of the New Zealand School of Food & Wine, which she courageously relocated to Auckland after the 2011 Christchurch earthquake. This unexpected shake put paid to both the building and the business she ran from it in the South Island’s biggest city, so she bravely put her three children and a bunch of banana boxes full of their personal possessions in the car and headed for the hills – the Bombay Hills. She has since forged a reputation as a food and wine educa...

Monday afternoon vino with Neal Ibbotson

The biggest extravagance and the best investment that Neal Ibbotson ever made was the engagement ring he bought for his wife, Judy, who shares in the life of Saint Clair Family Estate, one of New Zealand’s biggest and most successful wine producers. He got into the wine industry aged 50 and doesn’t do regrets but, if he did, it would be not getting into winemaking earlier. His mother lived to be 104. She was the inspiration behind the eponymous sparkling wine, Dawn, one of New Zealand’s...

Friday morning drinks with Tony Bish, king of Chardonnay

If Tony Bish has anything to do with his own reincarnation, he says he would like to come back as a game changer. Some might say he has already achieved this admirable trait by forging a name for himself as Hawke’s Bay’s king of Chardonnay and in building a family business in one of Napier’s most iconic and once neglected buildings, the National Tobacco Company at Ahuriri. He loathes greenness in wine, loves humility in people and has a life time motto to live life to the full because, ...

Monday morning wine with Ed Donaldson

Getting to know the people behind the wines and learning about their journeys can be as interesting as New Zealand’s best wines taste, which was the inspiration for this interview. It’s the third in a new series on this website, delving into the people behind the scenes. The following is a refreshing take on wine from the multi talented Ed Donaldson, whose taste in music and food is as legendary as his palate. Ed is the marketing manager and third eldest of four sons of the Donaldson fami...

Friday morning wine with Duncan Forsyth

Lifelong friends, a bloody Mary and a slushy machine all rate highly for Duncan Forsyth, of Mount Edward Winery in Central Otago. He was the first in New Zealand to sell high quality Pinot Noir on tap to restaurants. He rates southern Spain as his favourite wine region, among a couple of other regions, and finds working from home to be a bit of a distraction but life and work go on, as he shares this Friday morning in this website’s new wine take on the famous Proust questionnaire, which or...

Rapaura Springs puts Sauvignon’s best foot forward

Rapaura Springs is a winery owned by Ian and Rosemary Wiffin, Margaret and Brendan Neylon and John Neylon. The Neylon family have been instrumental pioneers in Marlborough’s green lip mussel industry and also now own substantial vineyard land in Rapaura and Dillons Point in Marlborough. They describe their vineyard land as prime and their top wines support this assertion with consistently high quality, dry styles and  medium to full bodied styles. This week I tasted their four new Sauv...

Friday wine with Malcolm Rees-Francis

It’s nine days into nationwide lockdown in New Zealand and  Central Otago winemaker Malcolm Rees-Francis is living in alternate states of thankfulness and disbelief, in between being interviewed for this chat about life, the state of the world and wine. “The sin is being boring,” he told me, of what makes a wine unappealing, adding that he would rather have a bad wine than a boring one because there is no hook for your interest and your brain or for your tastebuds. Here, Malcolm ta...

Riesling around the world – tasting 23 September (and wine of the week)

After a week of pointless travelling up and down the North Island, it’s easy to lose heart, especially with full lockdown back in place so I’m grateful for the reminder to be grateful and today’s gratitude comes for the sunshine and my favourite white grape variety. Riesling is near to my heart and the theme of a tasting that I am lucky enough to host on Thursday 23 September at 6pm at Regional Wines & Spirits in Wellington. It’s also the reason for today’s work (‘work’) in...

Homage to a friend

It’s a bittersweet day. Thankful for the warmth of the sun’s rays and chilled by the wind, I am reminded by both of a friend who chose to say goodbye this week. He kept popping in to work to say hi and suggest a catch up. We used to catch up often but life gets in the way. I moved. He had plans to buy a house nearby at one stage. I kept meaning to touch base and earlier this week I planned to call and finally arrange that catch up. Turns out I was too late. I can’t help but feel sad for...

Five Pinot Noirs to see you through lockdown

It’s International Pinot Noir Day and there is plenty to celebrate here in New Zealand, despite being back in Alert level 4 lockdown. The announcement of the latest lockdown saw wine sales spike within 10 minutes online as well as in stores throughout this country. I was standing in store at the Hamilton Beer & Wine Co when the announcement came through and customers buying wine weren’t heading for the cheap and cheerful but for high  quality bottles; “I want to enjoy something rea...

Great dirt from Esk Valley news and reviews

Great Dirt is a great name and I’m not going to beat around the bush; the Great Dirt Syrah is one of the red wine highlights of my year so far. It’s been a tough one for many, not least for the winery that has just launched this evocatively named new wine brand, Esk Valley, which is part of Villa Maria Wines. Winemaker Gordon Russell started at Esk in 1993 and has since forged a reputation for making a wide range of wines from the quirky (Chenin Blanc and Verdelho) to the mainstream with&...

Writers share their trade secrets

Hamilton Book Month is here and I am flattered to be taking part as the panel chair with a bunch of fellow wine writers at the Hamilton Beer & Wine Co next Wednesday 18 August from 6.30pm to 8.30pm. If you’ve ever wondered how an accountant becomes a wine writer or how a wine writer remains sober during day time hours, pop along and join us. Bookings are required for this event, which will see four of us chat about our best two wines up to $35 in value – and share them with those who...

Wild Canterbury Pinot pushes beautiful boundaries

I’d heard vicious rumours of dry July but it must’ve been somewhere else because Martinborough was extremely wet last month and so were the insides of my wine glass. One of the best wines of the month was a wild ferment Pinot Noir from a region that is among my go-to, all time favourite places when it comes to drop dead deliciously good wines, most of which are made by small, family owned producers. That place is North Canterbury. And this pre amble is my segue into a long awaited review ...

Paper Nautilus new release

There’s nothing like a massive writing deadline to put paid to nearly everything else in life and with the deadline looming faster than bears thinking about, I am extremely focussed on creating a good read and obsessively researching to ensure the facts are on the nail as well. The new project will be revealed in the fullness of time and in the meantime, here is last week’s blog, intended to be published on Friday but with a deadline hanging over me like a dark cloud, well, sorry, it’s ...

The Chenin mystery, a wine of the week

Joelle Thomson’s weekly column is published on Fridays. The decline of Chenin in New Zealand remains a mystery 11 June 2021 South African wines made headlines in one of the most respected newspapers in the world this year because of a relatively obscure grape variety, Chenin Blanc, which can hold its own with the finest white wines, wrote UK critic Jancis Robinson MW in the Financial Times last month. It will come as good news to South Africa’s winemakers whose industry has had it tough...

Four shades of Otago Pinot from Valli

Grant Taylor, founder and owner of Valli Vineyards, is one of the most interesting creators of Central Otago Pinot Noir. There are four different Pinot Noirs made every year but there are no tiers in the range, although no doubt there are plenty of tears in frosty years because Central is the most southern wine region in the world and can be rather chilly. My wine of the week is arguably the edgiest of the four and that’s what I love about it. Reviews of the other three Pinots still to come...

Five (very) good Pinot Noirs under $25

Is it possible to buy great Pinot Noir for less than $20? The short answer is: no. But, inspired by a couple who attended Winetopia in Wellington in the weekend, I thought the time was nigh to share my five best buy recommendations under $25, which is the threshold (if you know where to shop) for very good quality Pinot on a budget. It may be more than you’d ideally like to spend on a weeknight red but how big is the dent that take out coffees make in your wallet each week? Perhaps it means...

Best new release, 21 May 2021, 2017 Doctors Flat Pinot Noir

Many people have a dream retirement job while others retire so that they can dream. Steve Davies was in the first camp when he longed for a small vineyard of his own to plant in grapes, make top notch wine and fund his later years and create a job he loves. In 2002, he began to do just that, buying about four hectares of land on a windy, elevated site on Hall Road in Bannockburn, Central Otago. He built a modest house, planted three hectares of Pinot Noir right next to it and has since set ab...

Best new release, 19 May 2021, 2019 Zen Chardonnay

Tony Bish is, for many, the Hawke’s Bay king of Chardonnay. Not that he is alone in producing superlative dry whites in New Zealand’s second biggest wine region. He has earnt the mantle as King of Chardonnay because he has dedicated his Urban Winery (a bar, restaurant and working winery) entirely to Chardonnay; the world’s most popular wine grape. The wine at the top of his Chardonnay tree is called Zen and it’s not cheap. A single bottle goes for $139.99, give or take, depending on w...

First International Viognier Day launches

It’s big, it’s bold, it’s voluptuous and it nearly died out last century, but now Viognier has its own international day. The first International Viognier Day was launched this year by Yalumba Wines. This South Australian winery has done much to revive this grape’s flagging fortunes by working on Viognier clonal selection and setting up the first ever Viognier Symposium in 2002 as well as encouraging other wineries to produce this full bodied, flavoursome white wine, which has distinc...

Homage to Cabernet Franc

It’s not exactly the green turtle or the reptilian hawksbill turtle (both now in sanctuary in the Philippines, a rare success story) but Cabernet Franc is one of the rarer great red grape varieties in the world and it has now declined by nearly 50% over the past 10 years in New Zealand. Is it because it has never been ranked as highly as Cabernet Sauvignon, which has also dropped to 219 hectares from 519; a more understandable decline since it is so tough to ripen Cab’ Sauv’. French win...

Sauvignon Blanc Day 7 May

Tomorrow is International Sauvignon Blanc Day and it’s especially important to New Zealand, the world HQ of Sauvignon Blanc. The most planted grape in New Zealand and responsible for over 85% of this country’s wine exports, Sauvignon Blanc is made in an increasingly wide range of styles from upfront, fruity and off dry to creamy, complex, new wave fumé styles to dry, flinty wines that bear more than mere passing resemblance to good Sancerre and Pouilly Fumé. Enter the new 2020 Hunter’...