Reviews of past and current vintages, Benfield & Delamare

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Reviews of current and past vintages
Benfield & Delamare Martinborough 2006
Australian Gourmet Traveller	Bill Benfield is not the region's only producer of red wine made from Bordeaux grapes, but he is its most ardent supporter of the style. This 2006 wine is elegance on a grand scale, with powerful and complex fruit and spice flavours that linger tantalisingly. A classic.
Benfield & Delamare Martinborough 2005
Neal Martin Rating: 92 points	A deep lucid garnet core with ruby rim. The nose is a little volatile at first but that soon blows away (therefore decanting or allowing the bottle to stand for 60 minutes is advised.) The nose reveals wonderful delineation and freshness, ripe black cherries, a touch of kirsch and fresh fig. The palate is medium-bodied, ripe but not overly so, very well-balanced, harmonious but slightly grainy in texture with very pure, opulent fruits that never become overbearing. Blackberries, plum, and a touch of soy appear on the elegant finish. This is an outstanding wine to drink over 3-8 years. Small is beautiful. A bone fide small, family producer, Bill and Sue Delamare own just 6.5 acres in Martinborough and seem content just to produce top-quality Bordeaux abiding the tenets of Emile Peynaud. This is quintessential meticulous winemaking, the results are there for you to savour in this, the only wine they currently release.
Benfield & Delamare Martinborough 2005
Regional Wines & Spirits Newsletter Raymond Chan	From the outset with the 1989 vintage, Bill Benfield and Sue Delamare were going to be different and against the grain in Martinborough. Their almost fanatical approach to quality at all costs has had them pay dearly in the amount of wine they release. However, as a recompense, the wines are quite simply, outstanding examples of Bordeaux-styled reds that stand tall in an international perspective. And this is from fruit grown in Pinot Noir country! The Benfield & Delamare operation is tiny – just the two owners – no-one else. The Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Franc vines are close-planted, with a total of only just over 2 hectares in vines on the Martinborough Terraces. This is more ‘garagiste’ than the ‘garagiste’ wines of St Emilion! The new 2005 Benfield & Delamare is a stunning wine of exceptionally fine quality. This is a wine of classical Bordeaux dimensions and style and totally traditional in outlook, without any of the excesses that are rewarded by many influential wine publications at present. The colour is dense and dark, and the aroma is redolent of fully-ripened black berries and dark plums with a complex black olive savoury nuance. Breathing enables cassis elements to emerge. The palate is rich with restraint. Beautifully handled oak gives a note of spice. The sweetness of the wine is countered perfectly by the fine extraction. The 2005 Benfield & Delamare is not a monstrous showy wine, but a wine of elegance and proportion. It will always be an excellent wine over dinner. 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 25% Merlot, 10% Cabernet Franc. Only 99 cases made.
2003 Benfield & Delamare Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon/Cabernet Franc
Geoff Kelly Wine Reviews	Ruby, carmine and velvet, one of the deepest. The 2003 Benfield & Delamare has been eagerly awaited, for the vintage was a great one in Martinborough. Public release was this debut at the Regional Roadshow, but though the wine has been released to the mailing list, and is available at the winery, release to the limited number of trade outlets is expected "shortly". Bouquet is wonderfully full and fragrant, with at this stage, the trademark spicy clove and nutmeg oak dominant, and plummy fruit below. Palate is another matter altogether, with a texture and viscosity to the densely plummy and cassisy fruit which is remarkable, and covers the oak totally. And the low alcohol is magical, the way Bordeaux used to be. Martinborough in its warmest years achieves a similar fruit complexity and flavour to Bordeaux, and this wine is one of the best achievements yet from these two committed proprietors. From memory, only two other vintages of theirs in the last 14 years compare with this 2003. Expensive, but in the top years, the quality and rarity of this wine combine to make it a distinctive and desirable top New Zealand claret style. Cellar 5 – 15 years, maybe longer. GK 10/05
2002 Benfield & Delamare Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon/Cabernet Franc
2005 Wine Guide Michael Cooper	Bill Benfield and Sue Delamare specialise in claret-style reds of exceptional quality and impressive longetivity at their tiny Martinborough winery. Benfield & Delamare is typically slightly leaner than the leading Hawke's Bay reds, yet very elegant, intensely flavoured and complex. The 2002 vintage (*****) is a blend of Merlot (50%), Cabernet Sauvignon(43%) and Cabernet Franc (7 per cent), matured in French oak barriques (70% new). Stylish and concentrated, with sweet fruit delights and rich cassis, plum, herb and sapice flavours, it shows excellent complexity,with a firm tannin backbone. Fleshy generous and well-structured, it's a wine of real class and individuality.
Sunday Star Times Michael Cooper 18th April, 2004	**1/2 One of the great individualists of the New Zealand wine industry, Bill Benfield delights in producing a superior claret-style red in Martinborough, where nearly everyone else is focusing on pinot noir. A fleshy, concentrated blend of merlot, cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc, Benfield & Delamare 2002 (**1/2) $52.50 is sturdy, with powerful blackcurrant,spice and herb flavours, French oak complexity and firm, ripe tannins. A rare, high priced wine, it's full of personality.
2001 Benfield & Delamare Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon/Cabernet Franc Silver medal at Vinales International 2004 in Paris Five Star Winestate magazine Silver at International Wine Challenge London
Wine International October 2003	Silver Medal Ripe, bitter cherry fruit and a silky, seductive texture entrance the taster. Elements of grass, minerals and cigar box add complexity to this stunning wine.
Winestate Michael Coopers’s New Releases May June	Fleshy, fruit crammed Martinborough blend of Merlot (85%), cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc, matured in French oak casks. Lush, rich wine, plummy, spicy and nutty, that caresses the mouth with sweet-fruit delights. Already highly drinkable, but top drinking 2005+
2000 Cabernet Sauvignon/Cabernet Franc Silver at International Wine Challenge London
Wine Magazine November 2002	Husband and wife team Benfield & Delamare have done a wonderful job on this wine. Big ripe, soft fruit and warm alcohol are supported by delicious smoky wood.
1999 Cabernet Sauvignon / Merlot Silver at International Wine Challenge London
NZ Federation of Wine and Food Societies Newsletter January 02 Stanley Harris	Martinborough’s Benfield & Delamare has acquired a well deserved reputation for the winery’s highly acclaimed blended reds, their latest vintage, 1999, is exceptional. The focus of attention at first taste is on superbly sweet ripe fruit, the palate gorgeously velvet soft. It has understated power and is the ultimate in stunning elegance.
Wine Magazine November 2001	A restrained wine with a closed nose which gains in poise with great finesse on the palate. Plummy red fruit flavours in evidence should mature well.
1998 Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon Silver at International Wine Challenge London
	Tasters found lifted plums, vanilla oak and a touch of gamine on the nose. The palate offers subtle allspice hints, along with cherry flavours and a minty dry tannic finish.
Worth Cellaring Geoff Kelly	One of the finest local claret styles to come my way lately it the 1998 Benfield & Delamare. By claret style I mean Bordeaux like. The main point of difference is the spicy nutmeg oak reminiscent of Gary Farr at Bannockburn, or odd moutons on reflection. Attractive anyway. Fruit ripeness and berry flavour are sensational balance is superb.
1997 Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot/Cabernet Franc
Metro Magazine Tim Harris May 1999	For a rare and special treat in the style of the medoc, look for Benfield & Delamare 1997, a blend of cabernet sauvignon merlot and cabernet franc. It is young and not huge in body but it has a marvelous supple structure - the firm quite savoury flavours of the medoc and great length of fine pervasive tannin. It is New Zealand wine in structure, but its rare to find wine with such broad savoury Bordeaux like characters in New Zealand wine.
1996 Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot Cabernet Franc
CUISINE Best of the Bunch Bob Campbell March 1998	One of the most impressive reds yet released from this small Wairarapa Winery. A blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot it offers ripe and concentrated berry-fruit flavours with hints of spice, tar and toasty oak. A classic cellar wine, impressive now, but will develop greater complexity and a mellower texture with bottle age.
Regional Wines & Spirits Newsletter Dec-Jan 1997-1998	Benfield & Delamare 1996. The best vintage and best wines yet. Deep purple red. Beautifully ripe, perfumed fruit aromas of currants and dark plums, a hint of game too. Fine grained silky tannins long on the finish. Quite complete. 19.5/20
1995 Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot/Malbec
Cuisine May 1997 Bob Campbell	This latest release is from a difficult Martinborough vintage and yet the wine shows great concentration and ripeness. A big complex red that should cellar well.
Penguin Good New Zealand Wine Guide Vic Williams	Tonnes of ripe fruit aromas,and a palate structure that is weighty but also very elegant, make this a very impressive wine.
1990-91
The Sydney Morning Herald Fine Wine Huon Hooke	The winery is called Benfield & Delamare (the latter his wife’s name), and its a dolls’ house. The 1.5 hectare vineyard patterned fastidiously on Bordeaux. You’d swear you’d stepped through a window into a vineyard in St Emillion or the Medoc. The pruning method is knee-high single and double guyot in a world where big vines are the norm and convoluted trellises such as Scott Henry, Lyre and Sylvos are the buzz names. The vines are trained very low. His wines are certainly lovely, and show remarkably little of the vegetal flavours of many cool area kiwi cabernets. The 90 is lovely soft, rich, dark berry and floral wine with touches of cassis and earth. The 91 is lively with some firmness and good concentration.