Picking up where we left off last week”¦

Argentina over here, New Zealand over there. Malbecs to the left, Sauvignons to the right. I’ve already taken you tasting through 10 of the reds; now we’ll sip through seven of the whites.

The 32nd annual Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival swings into our spring in just a few days, running April 19 to 25. Forty-one New Zealand wineries will be visiting, New Zealand and Argentina being the “theme” countries this year. And while there’s plenty of red to be poured by them, mostly Pinot Noir, I think the real action comes from the whites—specifically, although not exclusively, Sauvignon Blanc.

I picked seven New Zealand SBs at random but by price; as was the case with the Argentine Malbecs last week, they start with the cheapest I could find ($14.99) and then go up by a buck to $19.99. Didn’t have enough room on the credit card to hit the heights of Cloudy Bay’s ($31.50). Most of the wines were labelled as being from the Marlborough growing region; of the wines tasted below, Stoneleigh, Giesen, O:Tu, and Spy Valley are here to pour, and there may be others.

Welcome to the taste profiles of gooseberries and cat’s pee.

Newharbor Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2008 ($14.99)
Bright and easy to drink, fresh if somewhat indistinct, there may be a reason they’ve come in at the cheap end with this one. Adequate SB, short fruit, a bit of bite. Ideally, it’s a $10 wine and that’s where, say, the Chileans would have priced it.

Cat’s Pee on a Gooseberry Bush Sauvignon Blanc 2008 ($15.99)
“Taking the piss” is a venerable Brit tradition; this is the iconic label that came out swinging by calling it like it often is. “Helping the SPCA to provide creature comforts” says the bullet on the front label. It continues: “”¦the grapes were carefully selected to capture the famous character and essence of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc”¦a wine with strong gooseberry aromas and gentle hints of cat!” Gentle hints, indeed—nothing here is taken too seriously, but the wine isn’t all that catty or even goosey. They’ve tamed the tough edges of those two characteristics and achieved a full, fresh SB that’s just the ticket with salad, seafood, creamy pasta, salmon chowder with dill (out of Whitecap’s Salmon: The Cookbook), and other lighter spring fair.

Giesen Estate Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2008 ($16.99)
Excellent example of the new breed of NZ SBs, starting with pale lemon colour, “ ”˜lifted’, fresh aromas of sweet gooseberry and dried cut grass”. I’ve never known what “lifted” means, but a lot of tasters sure use it. And for that matter, hands up all those who’ve recently tasted gooseberries off the cane. The official tasting sheet also points out “classic nettle and gooseberry flavours”, making it the perfect foil for asparagus, goat cheese, and salads as well as richer shellfish. Last year, it copped a Penguin Award as the best New Zealand SB. Get past the script and there’s much to like here.

Stoneleigh Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2009 ($16.99)
This is the freshest of the SBs lined up here, i.e., the newest vintage (2009); it costs the same as the Giesen, and the two run neck and neck in terms of freshness and flavour. The winemaker leads our palates to an “intense bouquet of passion fruit and grapefruit with background mineral notes”. Certainly there is huge fruit—gooseberry or what?—making for a very tart wine, so be careful what you serve it with. Big fruit in front, very dry at the finish. I’m thinking fresh Tahitian pineapple, grilled; Craig Claiborne’s Jamaican beans with rum and molasses. A winner all around.

Starborough Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2008 ($17.99)
Okay, it’s fresh, it’s crisp, and it’s bright, but it isn’t very elegant. There’s something a bit clunky about the way fruit, acid, and sugar (or lack of it!) try to come together here. We moved right along.

O:Tu Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2008 ($18.99)
This is very much a food wine—come to think of it, they all are, really. I mean, none of these are wines you’re going to want to sit and sip with conversation. They all need the added impact of thought-through food pairings, and this one can stand up to Italian chicken livers sautéed with fresh sage and prosciutto and chili flakes, plus a splodge of Marsala for contrast. Softer than some of the others, but with a good ratio of sugar to acidity.

Spy Valley Sauvignon Blanc 2008 ($19.99)
We liked this quite a bit when it first hit town about a year ago and we’re still liking it, with those ubiquitous gooseberries front and centre. Label speak alerts us to more passion- and grapefruit as well as “sweet pea”, which was new to those tasting. Why not? Nice and dry, tart but not overwhelmingly so, with lots of guts to stand up to vegetable dishes, cream sauces for fish, and olive-oil-poached chicken.

The three-star selection:

1. Giesen, Stoneleigh (tied)

2. Cat’s Pee on a Gooseberry Bush

3. Spy Valley

Plenty more for the tasting starting April 19 at the festival.