Wine Advocate 95+
 
The 2022 Rays Road Chardonnay is fine and spicy, with a tense line of acidity and phenolics—they feel linear and interwoven—that stream through the fruit. This is a very pretty, pithy Chardonnay with ground white pepper, white flesh peach, crushed shells, layers of juniper berry and star anise/cut fennel inflections. I like the staying power of the fruit in the mouth. It is persistent and long. This is really nicely done, and I'm looking forward to seeing this wine (and this vineyard) more over its journey. 12.5% alcohol, sealed under screw cap.
 
At Kumeu River Wines our winemaking philosophy is simple. We endeavour to grow grapes of the highest standard and then treat them with respect when we turn them into wine. In this way the potential quality is maximised, and we are able to produce wines that are truly representative of our land. To this end our vineyards are trained on the “Lyre” trellis to optimise their exposure to light and therefore the ripeness of the grapes. Yields are kept low to improve the concentration of aromas and flavours in the grapes, and we harvest all of our grapes by hand. This allows us to remove faulty berries in the field so that our quality grapes may arrive at the winery in pristine condition. The white grapes are all whole-bunch pressed, which is time-consuming but gives us the best quality results. The reds are destemmed and crushed gently before being transferred to fermentation tanks. No yeasts are added, as we rely solely on the indigenous yeasts that are present in the vineyard to conduct our fermentations.