Winemaker Notes
A complex wine with red fruit flavors. Big, elegant and ripe tannin structures. Will over time show more secondary and forest floor characteristics.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Intense but really attractive notes of ripe stems, blackberry crumble, incense, jasmine, pressed violets, bark and ivy extract. The palate's also a mouthful with chewy tannins, but it's delivered across a bed of razor-sharp acidity that brings it through to a mouthwatering finish. Really well done. Drink in 2021.
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Decanter
Pinotage may not be the most fashionable grape variety but I urge you to try this entry-level example from one of South Africa's finest producers. The grapes are fermented in open concrete vats before maturing for 14 months in second-use French oak barriques, combining the juicy red fruits of Pinotage with the rich complexities of the oak. Consequently, this is a softly structured wine displaying intense red berry flavours joined by coffee, cream and chocolate notes. Try it with hearty pasta dishes. Drinking Window 2019 - 2024
South Africa’s signature grape, Pinotage is a distinctively earthy and rustic variety. In 1924 viticulturists crossed finicky Pinot Noir and productive, heat-tolerant Cinsault, and created a variety both darker and bolder than either of its parents! Today it is popular in South Africa both as a single varietal wine and in Cape blends. Somm Secret—The name “Pinotage” is a subtle portmanteau. The Pinot part is obvious, but the second half is a bit confusing. In the early 1900s, Cinsault was known in South Africa as “Hermitage”—hence Pinotage.
South Africa’s most famous wine-producing district, Stellenbosch, surrounds the historic town with the same name; fine winemaking here dates back to the late 1600s. Its valleys of granite, sandstone and alluvial loam soils between the towering blue-grey mountains of Stellenbosch, Simonsberg and Helderberg have the capacity to produce beautiful wines from many varieties. The climate is warm Mediterranean, tempered by the cool Atlantic air of nearby False Bay.
Perhaps most well-known for its Pinotage and Bordeaux blends, Stellenbosch also produces noteworthy wines from Syrah, Chenin blanc, Chardonnay and Sauvignon blanc. The district’s wards—Banghoek, Bottelary, Devon Valley, Jonkershoek Valley, Papegaaiberg, Polkadraai Hills and Simonsberg-Stellenbosch—all produce distinctive wines from vines with relatively low yields.