Wine of the week: a classy and invigorating Kiwi sauvignon blanc

(Image credit: 2020 Dog Point Vineyard wine)

published 20 August 2021

2020 Dog Point Vineyard, Sauvignon Blanc, Marlborough, New Zealand

Ivan Sutherland and James Healy met at Cloudy Bay over three decades ago. Along with fellow wine legends Kevin Judd and David Hohnen, these visionary gentlemen put the sauvignon blanc grape variety on everyone’s lips.

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Long before Cloudy Bay launched in the mid-Eighties, Ivan and his wife Margaret were among the earliest Marlborough wine industry pioneers planting grapes in the late 1970s. After leaving Cloudy Bay, the Sutherlands and Healys set up Dog Point Vineyard and launched this stellar label in 2004.

I have followed this brand from day one, and they have only ever released exemplary wines. With this extraordinary history, pioneering spirit and genuine influence on the whole of the wine world and its drinkers, it was exciting to read that Ivan highly rates the 2020 vintage.

“For overall fruit quality, this is one of the best I have experienced in over 30 years in the NZ wine industry,” he says. His assessment is spot on: this is as classy, long, lean, brittle and invigorating as any Dog Point Sauvignon I have tasted. The Wine Society has just received a shipment from New Zealand, and the prices seem incredibly keen.

Alongside my featured wine, do pick up some 2018 Section 94 Sauvignon Blanc (£20) with its subtle, resonant oak-influenced palate; and also the majestic 2018 Dog Point Pinot Noir (£25), which is one of the finest and most controlled reds made here.

Matthew Jukes is a winner of the International Wine & Spirit Competition’s Communicator of the Year (matthewjukes.com).

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Matthew Jukes has worked in the UK wine business for well over three decades and during this time has written 14 wine books.

Matthew regularly lectures, judges, speaks at wine conferences and runs masterclass tastings for both corporate and private clients all over the world. Matthew is also the creator of his ground-breaking initiative, the One Day Wine School, an indulgent day of tasting and learning first performed in 2006.

He has been the MoneyWeek wine correspondent since 2006 and has written a weekly column for the Daily Mail’s Weekend Magazine since 1999. His four highly-acclaimed, annual wine reports – the Burgundy En Primeur Report, the Bordeaux En Primeur Report, the Piemonte Report and the 100 Best Australian Wines – are published on his website, www.matthewjukes.com.

Matthew is one of the world’s leading experts on Australian wine and, with Brisbane-based wine writer Tyson Stelzer, runs an annual competition in Australia to find ‘The Great Australian Red’. He was made Honorary Australian of the Year in the UK at the 2012 Australia Day Foundation Gala dinner.

Matthew is a winner of the International Wine and Spirit Competition's Communicator of the Year Trophy. His thoughts, recommendations and tastings notes are followed very closely by the wine world at large.