2020 Puriri Hills Pope

Brand	Puriri Hills
Region	Auckland
Varietal	Merlot Cab Franc Cab Sauv
Size	750ml
Alcohol %	14.0%
Vintage	2020
Country	New Zealand

Puriri Hills top wine is appropriately named ‘Pope’ – it’s a wine to be revered, admired, and respected just as you would in the company of Pope Francis. Originally named after Ivan Pope, the 2020 vintage is a blend of Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Carménère, and Malbec. A perfect vintage and one that reaffirmed quality in the region, the handpicked fruit was harvested at a miserly 1kg per vine and saw nearly 2 years in 80% new French Oak before bottling without fining or filtration. Sealed under the finest, most expensive cork, it’s a powerful, concentrated, deeply layered red wine that should live for 25-30 years if properly stored. No other NZ red is made so fastidiously & expensively from ground to glass. The Pope is NZ’s #1 red wine in our opinion… Judy and her team have made it that way through ruthless dedication to quality. Only produced in exceptional years – in the last 11 vintages… only 5 Popes were made. All outstanding… 2010-2013-2014-2015 & capped by this “GOAT” 2020 vintage! If you want to open a bottle now at 4-years of age… give it a “Double Decant” to enable it to open to the air and reveal some of its brooding complexity and beauty. But like the best vintages of Bordeaux’s 1st Growths… you really should commit to aging at least through the 15-year mark (2035+) and beyond to experience its true majesty. Unlike Bordeaux’s 1st Growths with productions ranging between 120,000 & 240,00 bottles… a miserly 4,600 bottles of Pope are produced. Make sure invest in a few bottles or a case of the “GOAT” of NZ’s greatest red wine.

A bouquet of astonishing quality and concentration – complex notes of exotic perfumes including violets, cassis, dried plum, nutmeg, graphite, leather plus hints of dark chocolate and liquorice.

Whopping concentration and great beauty simultaneously. Delicate perfumes, dark cherries and berries infused with chocolate... succulent and creamy but with purity of dense fruit evolving to a rich, spicy, and refreshing crescendo of power. Unlike anything you will have tasted from NZ before. An amazingly complete wine – hard to imagine how it could possibly be better. Push the boat out and grab what you can afford… the 2020 vintage is a masterpiece to savour, share, impress and contemplate through to 2040+.