Winemaker Notes
2017 was dry and warm, resulting in healthy, small grapes with good intensity. Greater variation between night and daytime temperatures during the ripening stage fostered the favorable development of color and flavors. The wines are of an exceptional quality.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Pretty yellow apple, mirabelle plum and white peach flavors are gilded with honeysuckle and verbena notes. Shows good length on the finish, with a pretty whiff of shortbread. Chenin Blanc.Smart Buy
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Wine & Spirits
This is a quiet vintage of the Carêmes’ South African chenin blanc, the fruit off 40-year-old dry-farmed vines grown on shale and granite. Fermented with ambient yeasts in a mix of stainless steel and wood tanks (a small portion ferments in barriques), it feels broad and earthy, with an oily richness to the fruit. That fruit falls somewhere between lemon meringue and white peach, slightly floral and tangy, a match for white-fleshed fish dishes.
Unquestionably one of the most diverse grape varieties, Chenin Blanc can do it all. It shines in every style from bone dry to unctuously sweet, oaked or unoaked, still or sparkling and even as the base for fortified wines and spirits. Perhaps Chenin Blanc’s greatest asset is its ever-present acidity, maintained even under warm growing conditions. Somm Secret—Landing in South Africa in the mid 1800s, today the country has double the acreage of Chenin Blanc planted compared to France. There is also a new wave of dedicated producers committed to restoring old Chenin vines.
Literally meaning "the black land," Swartland takes its name from the endangered, indigenous "renosterbos" (translating to rhino bush), which used to be plentiful enough to turn the entire landscape a dark color certain during times of year. The district, attracting some of the most adventurous and least interventionist winemakers, excels in robust and full-bodied reds as well as quality fortified wines.