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  • 2010
    • July
      • Rick Stein's Food Odyssey
        04/07/10

        Heron's Flight, Runner Duck Estate, Hyperion Wines, Omaha Bay Vineyard and Ransom Estate are proud to underline their committment to fine wine and regional food production to help bring one of the world’s most highly respected chefs, Rick Stein, to the stage in New Zealand. Check out the

  • 2009
    • April
      • Living the Dream
        16/04/09
        At the time of writing we are deeply embroiled in the business of harvesting and processing grapes – the time called “vintage”. This is the most intensely busy period of the winegrower’s year, and it goes on for around two months, from mid-March to around mid-May, depending upon which grape varietie

      • Coming up Rosés
        02/04/09
        A recent news item out of France was lamenting, quite rightly, proposed EU regulation changes which would allow rosé wines to be made by simply blending red and white. The traditional way of making rosé uses only red grapes. The process, which in France is called “saignée” (bleeding) involves the gr

    • March
      • It's not all bad
        01/03/09
        The daily round of news we are getting about global economic recession and its effects both abroad and in New Zealand is depressing and can be quite scary. The most dramatic manifestations of it so far have been overseas, although we are starting to see job losses in New Zealand, and those who are r

    • February
      • Sunny skies, black clouds, silver linings
        01/02/09
        At this time of year we expect the weather to be great – endless sunny days stretching into the distance. And so it has been, which is great for local winegrowers. In Matakana we had an excellent spring so the vines have set large crops. Since spring the summer has also been very kind. Warm and most

    • January
      • Pinot Gris
        01/01/09
        Many people prefer to drink white wine during the summer, so this is a good time to talk about the Matakana region’s most widely grown grape, Pinot Gris.

        Probably the best known Pinot Gris wines are those from the Alsace region of north eastern France. But it is widely grown elsewhere, fo

  • 2008
    • November
      • Syrah
        01/11/08
        The 2008 vintage in Matakana produced more wine from the syrah grape than from any other except pinot gris. Syrah has in a sense “crept up on us” in recent years, as it was almost totally overlooked during the vine renaissance in NZ which started in the 1970s. Even today the total acreage of syrah i

    • October
      • Wine Competitions
        01/10/08
        It has been said that what distinguishes the human species from other mammals is that we are the only political animal. Our need to compete amongst ourselves also makes us fairly unique in the animal kingdom. Many human endeavours in addition to sport lend themselves very well to the competitive urg

    • September
      • Winegrowers Whine
        01/09/08
        Last year I received a big response when I wrote about the myriad of compliance issues winegrowers are faced with, and how they impinge mightily upon our time. I did not include an estimate of what it all costs in money – that would be too depressing to calculate and contemplate.

        As of S

    • August
      • Sublime Inspiration
        01/08/08
        This is the time of year when the hard work is over, we can stop muttering darkly at the sky and indulge some finer sentiments about wine. One enduring idea is the relationship between art, thought and wine, and wine’s apparent role in inspiring poets, artists, musicians and writers down through the

    • July
      • Health and Pleasure
        01/07/08
        A number of research studies in the last 20 years or so have linked health benefits with moderate wine consumption. Most of these have focused on the anti-oxidant qualities of red wine in particular, with positive effects for inhibiting cancers, vascular disease, diabetes and other “lifestyle” condi

    • June
      • Vintage 2008
        01/06/08
        In Matakana we have had a number of vintages characterized by a long lead-in period of settled weather, 2005 most recently, but before that, coincidentally all of the even-numbered years going back to 1994 featured more or less settled weather. While these conditions produce uniformly excellent grap

    • April
      • When to pick?
        01/04/08
        Vintage in Matakana is now in full swing. Teams of grape pickers are sweeping across the hillsides snipping the season’s bounty from the vines, which is then collected by tractors and trailers carting the overflowing bins of luscious sweet grapes to the winery, where the bunches may be further sorte

    • February
      • Bird Burglars
        01/02/08
        Summer of 2008 has to date been like the summers we all fondly remember – warm and sunny, dry and golden. These are the sorts of summers which holiday-makers and grape growers dream of, and the kids can go back to school with the satisfaction of having had a great holiday season.

        We also

  • 2007
    • December
      • The Promise of things to Come
        01/12/07
        Early summer in the vineyard is an interesting time. We have by now weathered the vicissitudes of spring. You know the stuff - equinoxial gales from the west sometimes combined with thunderstorms bringing potentially devastating blasts of hail, and often colder than mid-winter. All this interspersed

    • November
      • Compliance fatigue
        23/11/07
        Given the recent Local Body Elections it seems timely to talk about the compliance requirements that are foisted by national, local and quasi-government organizations upon the citizens, especially those trying to make a living from their own enterprises. Businesses such as winegrowers, involved in p

    • October
      • Wine & Food at Kowhai Festival
        23/10/07
        The Kowhai Festival has been going for many years, and in more recent times there has been a wine and food component with the activities on the main day of the Festival. The first year we had a number of local winery participants was 1998. The wine and food event was held in the Warkworth wharf carp

    • September
      • Matakana Terroirists
        01/09/07
        If you have read much in recent years about wine you will have encountered the word “terroir”. It has no English equivalent but as you might detect, the word has a geographical origin. A very brief definition is that terroir is the total natural environment of any viticultural site, so it includes s

    • August
      • From Noah to Matakana – a 6000 year wine trail
        23/08/07
        There are hundreds of grape varieties which belong to the world’s only true winegrape species vitis vinifera. It is thought to have originated south of the Black Sea, in the region now known as Georgia and Armenia. This area is very close to Mount Ararat, where, according to the Bible, Noah’s Ark ca

    • July
      • Winegrowing with integrity
        23/07/07
        These days there is considerable public concern about environmental damage from careless farming practices, and awareness of the need to farm more sustainably. So it is understandable that people feel concerned when they see sprays being used in vineyards.

        Most vineyard spraying involves

    • May
      • Matakana vintage draws to a close
        23/05/07
        Matakana grapegrowers and winemakers have been preoccupied over the past eight weeks or so with vintage, which is the most intensely active and demanding part of the winegrowing year.

        Grape varieties ripen at slightly different times and in Matakana, this occurs between late March and lat

    • April
      • Wine tourism expanding
        23/04/07
        North Rodney has experienced huge change in recent years. Some of this has been driven by the emergence of the wine industry, which has been partly responsible for bringing more visitors to the district. Visitors come from far and wide: a survey undertaken at Ransom Wines during February this year i

    • March
      • Matakana Wines to the World
        01/03/07
        The wine business is highly competitive, both in New Zealand and around the world. We hear talk of “wine lakes” in the big European wine producing countries, and thousands of tonnes of grapes have been left on the vines in Australia in recent years because there is no market for them.

        Win

    • February
      • Winegrowing with integrity
        01/02/07
        These days there is considerable public concern about environmental damage from careless farming practices, and awareness of the need to farm more sustainably. So it is understandable that people feel concerned when they see sprays being used in vineyards.

        Most vineyard spraying involves

    • January
      • Wine scandal
        23/01/07
        What has become known in the trade as “The Wither Hills Debacle” has important implications for winegrowers and wine consumers everywhere.

        Because this featured in the national news for days on end last month most readers will know what it is about. Briefly, the Wither Hills wine company

  • 2006
    • December
      • Matakana winegrowing boom
        02/12/06
        With the recent formation of Matakana Winegrowers Incorporated, we have finally been able to get some idea of the size and shape of the local winegrowing industry.

        Here are some results from a recent survey of members which may interest readers.

        • The group was incorporated ear

    • November
      • Busting a few myths
        01/11/06
        When pastoral farmers are hanging out for lots of rain after the generally dry northern summers, grape growers want the opposite – if there is to be rain at all we want it to be brief and moderate.

        However this does not mean that moisture will cause problems. Consider humidity. Many peopl

    • October
      • Here we go again
        23/10/06
        For those whose living comes from the land, Spring marks the beginning of a new year in a very real way. This is the case for winegrowers as much as anyone.

        The winter vineyard maintenance jobs have been done and pruning should be finished by mid-September. Pruning is a critical operation

    • September
      • Strong support for local wines
        01/09/06
        In Melbourne recently I read an article in The Age which reported the AGM of the Victoria Winegrowers Association. The meeting noted that the Australian wine industry as a whole markets itself “from the bottom up”. The big Australian winemaking conglomerates focus on mass production of cheap “commod

    • June
      • Press Release - 06 June 2006
        06/06/06
        Grape growers and winemakers in the Matakana area have banded together to advance the interests and efforts of the industry in the North Rodney region. “The idea has been tossed around for several years and kicked into touch on a couple of occasions in the past but with the much larger number of gro