Region | |
---|---|
Subregion | New Zealand > Canterbury |
Colour | White |
Type | Still |
The 2020 Lion's Tooth Chardonnay is a totally different proposition to the Field of Fire Chardonnay from the same vintage. The wine is retained and placid on the nose ... the latent power of the thing is evident from the very first sniff. It is saturated with the curry leaf/cheesecloth/brine/preserved citrus notes that I associate with this producer, but the long throw of distance that the aromatics propose hint at great things. In the mouth, the wine speaks of crushed/salted/roasted nuts, red apple skins, peach fuzz and a hint of the little calcium deposits/flecks that one can find in Comté/Pradera cheese. That's why I eat those cheeses, and that's what I see here. What an exciting wine. Pure in its fruit profile, powerful in its acid/phenolic interplay, and so long through the finish. Yes! This is why we drink Chardonnay. 14% alcohol, sealed under screw cap. Drink 2023-2035.
More stony on the nose than the Field of Fire, like stone-dust. Very pithy, less toasty. A little less flinty than Field of Fire. Great freshness and it's intense in a super-tight and salty way, with a lightly creamy texture. The most stony/mineral of the wines. Great length. Most salty of all of the Pyramid Valley whites. More limestone = more tension? Fabulous length. So young but gorgeous already.
Lion’s Tooth hails from a two-acre vineyard only 100m from Field of Fire, but this time it has more calcium and active lime in the soil, and it is more easterly facing and slightly warmer. Interestingly, the grapes ripen at the same time as Field of Fire. This is another sour lime and raucous herb-steeped wine. There is more obvious fruit intensity coupled with a more elevated ripeness level. With this larger volume of flavour, there is also more muscle and brawn. Less obviously elegant than Field of Fire, Lion’s Tooth will be a slow mover, and it will blossom in time and will end up being a glorious, full wine with whip-crack acidity stanchioning the fruit.