Terre à Terre Sauvignon Blanc 2012 (Wrattonbully, SA)
13.5%, Screwcap, $30
Source: Sample
www.terreaterre.com.au

Xavier (Bizot, Terre à Terre winemaker) rates this as perhaps the finest Terre à Terre Sauvignon Blanc to date, the vintage conditions ‘almost ideal’. Most South Australian winemakers seems to love their ’12s actually, almost without exception, particularly for the reds. Early results looks pretty good too…

Fermented in a range of older French barriques and demi muids, this Sauvignon Blanc is sourced from the close planted Terre à Terre vineyard, located near the original Whalebone vineyard in Wrattonbully. It spends further time on lees and undergoes no malolactic fermentation.

The wine looks riper, fuller and denser this vintage too, the winemaking more overt, the acid firmer, the fruit more pineappley and leesy rich. I’ve had this Sauv twice now, once 3 months ago and again today, and it has barely moved, marking it as a very serious, dry, anything-but-passionfruit-juice, modern Sauvignon. It will need patience to fully integrate but, like the vintage it comes from, there is promise here.

Drink: Late 2013-2016
Score: 17.5/91+
Would I buy it? Not yet, but in the future?