The powerful ‘Bel Canto’ Dry Rieslings were served before the ‘regular’ sweeter wines, even though they have greater concentration. The ‘Bel Canto’ Dry Riesling 2010 is a baby, tight with an interesting mix of steeliness and raisiny fruit. This is still firm in mouthfeel and a little unyielding at present, but the potential to develop is evident. The ‘Bel Canto’ Dry Riesling 2008 (1.5 Litre) is beginning to show its true depth of character with lovely development aromas and flavours of honied limes and toast, the feature being its integration and harmony. This still has plenty of life ahead of it, say at least 5-6+ years. The Riesling 2009 is showing superbly, one of the highlights of the range on show. Broad and openly accessible, the rich and luscious lime, floral and honey flavours have a density that will hold this in great stead over the next 5-7 years. The Riesling 2008 (1.5 Litre) by contrast is very fine-featured, tight and a wine of great elegance. The classiness of the wine and its bottling in magnum format could see it cellar a decade more. It shows florals and limes, and a delicate honey and toast expression, all very concentrated and packed in.
Pegasus Bay is one of the country’s great wineries. The satisfying nature of all of the wines guarantees it will remain so. The Donaldson family are not afraid of flavour, richness, depth and character in their offerings across the range of wines they make, and know that keen wine enthusiasts enjoy these qualities. All of the wines have built-in complexities, or develop them, and more than a significant proportion of the range has that element of finesse of structure that lifts them into the outstanding category. Invariably these are the ‘Reserve’ wines, but the ‘regular’ releases also achieve that. Thank you Belinda and Edward for visiting Wellington!
