The 2024 Te Mata Estate is a delicious Chardonnay from one of New Zealand's very best producers that offers everything in balance. There's bright fruit upfront with juicy acidity leading to richness in the mid palate with subtle oak and creamy malolactic characters leading to a fine dry finish. Text book stuff and delightful drinking.
Winery notes (2024 Vintage)
"Estate Chardonnay ’24 shines with a white gold hue and pale honey highlights. It presents a delightful blend of peach, lemon rind, and buttered popcorn, complemented by bright and lively acidity that extends the wine’s long palate. The aroma is reminiscent of warm peach cobbler, intertwined with notes of marzipan, flint, and tarragon. Balanced by the signature racy freshness characteristic of ripe and fine Hawke’s Bay Chardonnay, making the Estate Chardonnay 2024 a standout.
Estate Chardonnay ’24 combines the best of traditional and modern winemaking. This involved tank fermentation to preserve the vibrant varietal aromas and clear, fresh fruit expression along with some barrel fermentation, barrel maturation on gross lees, and malolactic fermentation to enhance the complexity, richness and integration."
5 Stars & 93/100 Sam Kim, Wine Orbit, May 2025 (2024 Vintage)
"It's elegantly expressed on the nose, showing white flesh peach, fig, oatmeal, subtle vanilla, and roasted cashew aromas. The palate delivers succulent fruit flavours with creamy flow, backed by finely pitched acidity, finishing lingering and stylish. At its best: now to 2029."