Ceres is a Central Otago wine company owned by one of the industries pioneering wine families - The Dicey's. Brothers Matt and James and their father Robin, have a passion for focussed hand crafted wines that reflect the Bannockburn region.

3x Ceres Bannockburn Swansong Central Otago Pinot Gris 2017

AWARDED GOLD MEDAL: Sommelier Wine Awards 2017

Some chalky minerals unfold with aeration. Dry to taste and medium-full bodied, the palate has intense and concentrated flavours of white stonefruits, acacia and exotic florals, along with nuances of honeysuckle. This has very good depth, and the mouthfeel follows a very fine, textural, phenolic line with soft and balanced acidity. The palate flows with good drive to a lingering finish. This is a tightly bound, exotic fruited dry Pinot Gris with palate weight and texture, and good drive.

With each vintage, the objective with the winemakers  Pinot Gris is to achieve balance and harmony between; acid, sugar, pH, fruit flavours, aromas, alcohol, palate weight texture and phenolics. 2017 vintage was left on gross lees for 4 months and stirred weekly. Swansong vineyard is located on Felton Road, Bannockburn. It is a heavily terraced vineyard, planted in 2008. The soils are eroded gravels and clays with low fertility. The first year of production was 2011.

2017 was an interesting growing season to say the least. A wet warm spring enabled fantastic early growth with plenty of moisture in the soil to keep the vines happy. A marked changed occurred in December where temperatures dropped, and we entered one of the least memorable summers in recent history. Poor weather in December caused flowering to last up to 3 weeks which drove lower crop levels throughout Central Otago. A longer slower ripening period was thankfully finished off by some warmer periods in March which enabled everything to reach full ripeness.

Seal: Screw Cap - Alc: 14.5%

3x Ceres Composition Central Otago Pinot Noir 2017

Attractive and engaging bouquet of ripe red berry fruits - raspberry, plum and cherry, plenty of spice and mineral tones with a wild red rose perfume. On the palate - dry, fruity with flavours that reflect the nose - wild raspberry and plum, moderate toasty oak and oak spice layer, loads of energy, fine tannins and plenty of acidity, youthful.

Ceres Bannockburn Pinot Noir is made up of fruit from 2 vineyards in the sub-region of Bannockburn, totalling 8 ha. The Inlet vineyard - situated on a river terrace above the Bannockburn Inlet along Cairnmuir Orad in Bannockburn. Planted in 2002, the souls are loess ranging from 200-600mm on top of deep clay gravels, around 160,000 years old. On an elevation of 225-245. 5.25 ha. The second vineyard, Black Rabbit - neighbouring Inlet vineyard, 1.46 ha, the site elevation is 250-315m with ancient soils between 4 and 300 milion years old.

The beginning of spring bloomed dry and cool with low soil moisture coming into the season, November was charactersied by much cooler than normal temperatures. The vines got away to a reasonably slow start. December was warm and remarkably settled leading to a compact and successful flowering. The warm settled spell continued right through Januar February arrived and whilst warm was unusually damp, with much higher than average rainfall. March dried the vineyards out and the season finished with a warm flourish in April. We again started harvesting with lower sugars than typical at nice ripe flavours. The harvest was very compact; everything being harvested over a 21 day period.

The Composition 2016 Pinot Noir was fermented with wild yeast and spent 28 days on the skins; around 9 - 10 days cold soak, 8 - 9 days in ferment then 10 days post ferment. A blend of 30% Black Rabbit and 70% Inlet PN, with 417 dozen bottle

Seal: Screw Cap - Alc: 14%