In praise of mature Savvies

It's been a fair old sort of a lay-off; winter blues, perhaps, and then the delights of Tuscany - more of that anon, perhaps.

But, first, I see that just as spring has sprung, the first sauvignons of the season are beginning to find their way to my door.

I have deliberately refrained from sampling yet, because I wanted to get a couple of older - or should that be more mature - ones off my plate (or out of my goblet).

My thoughts on this were amplified by a recent trip to the UK and revived memories of the very beginnings of the sauvignon blanc goldrush.

In the late eighties and early nineties, English wine buffs discovered the charms of the wine that was to put us firmly on the world wine map: Marlborough sauvignon blanc.

One critic, Oz Clarke quickly labelled Marlborough savvy as "arguably the best in the world"; another famously likened the resultant wine to "cat's pee on a gooseberry bush"; and yet another remarked that being introduced to the taste of Marlborough sauvignon blanc was like "having sex for the first time".

I'm not sure I'd go quite that far, but you get the picture: back then quite a lot of fuss was being made of a grape grown in New Zealand which hitherto had somewhat anonymously been the backbone of such French classics as Sancerre and Pouilly Fume.

For a few years in London around this time, before Montana really got out of the blocks, New Zealand sauvignon blanc was synonymous with Cloudy Bay: and frequently you couldn't get it for love nor money.

If, of course, you had the advantage of visiting relatives in Marlborough in those early days, you would have known that Cloudy Bay - however good it was under the tutelage of winemaker Kevin Judd - wasn't the only kid on the block.

Just around the corner - and sharing pretty much identical terroir - was Hunter's which was making a drop that was every bit as good.

It was also being exported to England and those like yours truly, who had visited both wineries back then and sampled their respective wares, on more than one occasion was able to shimmy up the social ladder by producing Hunter's at this dinner party or that when the season's Cloudy Bay had long since sold out.

So I've long had a soft spot for this Marlborough producer.

Always something of a leading edge label, under chief winemaker Gary Duke it is now producing an aged sauvignon blanc - which is nothing new in itself, but with this one they seem to have got the ageing and oaking balance about right.

In the past I have been less than enamoured of such variations, preferring my savvies straight - that is to say, straight out of the stainless steel fermenter, into the bottle and a short spell later into the glass, fresh, vibrant, zingy and singing of the summer to come.

But Hunter's 2007 Kaho Roa (RRP $23.90) makes you think again.

It is a lightly oaked and aged style, blended to maintain the freshness of the archetypal sauvignon blanc, but with a portion imbued with a range of more complex flavour notes - both from the oak and the resting on lees.

For anyone who has lost patience with the numerous oak-heavy, over malo-lactic-ed chardonnays with their greasy mouthfeel, or fed-up with the lottery that is pinot gris - the lucky (or unlucky) dip of the Kiwi wine world - this is a very attractive alternative.

It will also hold up well with food.

While I'm on the subject of older sauvignons during the coming deluge of 2009s, look out for the Nautilus Sauvignon Blanc 2008.

Nautilus does not feel compelled to be first out of the blocks and to rush its new season savvy onto the market.

A little extra age in the tank and the bottle usually sees it arrive in the shops around Christmas or shortly after.

The additional time obviously does it no harm: Winemaker Clive Jones's 2008 brew earlier this year picked up a gold medal at the International Wine Challenge in London.

"Green and voluptuous with hints of smoke on the nose. Nice balance, crisp with good length . . . A classy wine" said the judges.

Having had the opportunity to sample the same, I would not disagree.

It's a tasty drop, with a little more to it than most, as reflected in the $25 RRP tag.

Still, you gets what you pays for, and this is one for which it is definitely worth shelling out a little extra.