Flint Vineyard Silex Blanc 2019 Norfolk, England 75cl

Silex is Flint Vineyard’s more serious, barrel-influenced white, and it shows the ambitious side of this young Waveney Valley estate on the Norfolk and Suffolk border. Where the winery’s Bacchus is all about zip and freshness, Silex is built for texture, weight and depth, and it has become one of the wines that marks Flint out among England’s newer producers.

It blends the classic trio of Pinot Blanc, Pinot Gris and Pinot Noir, all vinified as a white, and is matured in a mix of neutral and newer oak barrels for added complexity. The name nods to silex, the French for flint, and to the flinty soils that lend both the estate and the wine their character. Winemaker Ben Witchell handles the ageing carefully so the oak frames the fruit rather than covering it.

The 2019 came from a cool, even English growing season that favoured slow ripening and preserved the crisp acidity that carries the wine’s richer, barrel-worked frame.

The result is a textural, layered white with orchard and stone fruit, subtle nutty, mineral undertones from time in oak, and a long, fresh finish. The fruit is hand-harvested and the wine spends around a year in barrel before release. It has the presence to partner roast chicken, creamy pasta or firm white fish such as halibut, and it will reward a few years in the cellar.

Rated 91 points and often likened to a cool-climate white Burgundy, Silex is one for the curious drinker ready to see English white step up in ambition. A natural next bottle if you enjoy a restrained, lightly oaked Chardonnay.