This impressive Black Series Cap Classique uses Pinot Noir grapes harvested from the Elgin region and Chardonnay from the cool Agulhas region. Elgin has a wonderfully cool climate where the vines grow in sandstone soils laced with silica quartz fragments and acidic Bokkeveld shales rich in iron.
The Chardonnay is grown on Quoin Rock’s Boskloof farm on Koffieklip and gravel soils where the vines are also exposed to the cooling influences of the Atlantic Ocean air ensuring that the berries ripen evenly while retaining a vibrant natural acidity. The grapes were harvested from different sections of the Pinot Noir and Chardonnay blocks at different times before being transported to the vinification cellar located in Stellenbosch.
Made from a final blend of 54% Chardonnay and 46% Pinot Noir that was all harvested in February 2017, vinified and then aged on its lees for 5 years. The wine was bottled on the 23rd of September 2022, and while the 2018 release is also currently on sale, this pretty 2017 MCC is still available cellar door for R900 per bottle (£38pb).
Quoin Rock Black Series Cap Classique 2017, WO Western Cape, 12.91% Abv.
8.7g/l RS | 8.0g/l TA | 3.05pH
A bright shimmering bronze gold, the aromatics are striking, packed full of lemon and lime peel, salty brine, salted pistachios, honey brittle candy before savoury, leesy, brioche nuances develop in the glass. The palate steals the show with a density, intensity, and superb freshness combined with a harmonious balancing pear and white citrus length, carried with purity and precision on a piercing, creamy moussed finish. This really is a classy Cap Classique wine that can challenge some of the best premium Champagne cuvées out there. Drink now and over the next 5 to 8+ years.
It’s been over two decades since Paul Boutinot set up his Waterkloof Winery in 2003 on the slopes of the Helderberg in Stellenbosch. As a wine merchant at the time who was buying a lot of wine from Paul’s UK wine merchant company, Boutinot Wines, I certainly watched this new project with a lot of interest. Both Paul, and son Louis, were always adamant that the “Waterkloof” brand would only ever be used for the winery’s highest quality wines, and as such, this would take some time for the winemaking and vineyards to evolve to a point where this was possible. As a result, consumers have become well acquainted with Waterkloof’s Circumstance brand in the interim.
Roll forward to 2024 and we see their new Waterkloof Boreas Cape Bordeaux Blend produced by winemaker Nadia Langenegger, released at the winery. A blend of 51% Cabernet Franc, 24% Merlot, 14% Petit Verdot and 10% Cabernet Sauvignon, with the best parcels that are farmed regeneratively used in this blend that saw a whole-bunch wild yeast fermentation (with the exception of the Cabernet Sauvignon), foot-trodden in 9000 litre French oak open top foudre. The resulting wine was aged for 27 months in French oak barriques, with a 10% new component, as well as in the 9000 litre French oak foudre. The finished wine saw a gentle filtration with no fining or additives added other than a small amount of sulphur at bottling.
Waterkloof Winery Boreas 2020, WO Stellenbosch, 14% Abv.
The 2020 vintage in the Cape is known for its softer, more elegant, and accessible red expressions and this new Waterkloof release fits tightly into the broader generalities of the vintage. The aromatics are packed full of violets, graphite and iodine with pronounced notes of grilled red capsicum, dried herbs, fynbos and an intense sappy cedar spice complexity that melts into sweet black currant and mulberry fruits on a cool, creamy, finely textured palate. Picante and beautifully complex, the finish is silky and fine grained with lots of powdery black tea tannins, subtle complexing herby pyrazines, and a long, dusty, granitic tobacco spice finish. A very sleek, polished, dynamic wine with a high degree of winemaking flair on display. Drink this accessible 2020 vintage expression now on release and over the next 8-12+ years.
(Wine Safari Score: 94+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
The wines are distributed to the trade in the UK by Boutinot Wines and retails for circa £30 per bottle.
The Old Vine Conference is a non-profit organisation co-founded in 2021 by Sarah Abbott MW, a Master of Wine contemporary of mine, Alun Griffiths MW (previously of Berry Brothers & Rudd) together with Leo Austin. Its aim is to bring together a global network and create a new category for wine from old heritage vineyards. The organisation shares the belief that old vines are a beacon for talent, innovation, and connection and that the best old vines yield uniquely transcendent wines, incomparably rich in savour, symbolism, and heritage.
The genetic material of ancient varieties, often retrieved from forgotten old vineyards, is now proving vital in adapting to climate change and old vines have their valiant and inspirational champions in pockets around the world. But the global wine market does not yet structurally value old vines or treat old vine wine as a premium category of rich and enduring worth. As a result, healthy old vineyards of cultural resonance and unique qualitative potential are lost because they can’t be made to pay.
The Old Vine Conference is an attempt to change the path for old vines and their wines and in its first three years has contributed exponentially to the awareness, understanding and support of the global old vine movement. The London tasting at 67 Pall Mall in June 2024 was one of the largest selections of old vine wines from around the world, representing old vines from 19 countries including a phenomenal selection of 21 white and red wines from South Africa, drawn from the Old Vine Project’s membership. My scores for the South African selection are noted below:
Wines from the Old Vine Project:
Bellingham Bernard Series Old Vine Chenin Blanc Limited Release 2023 – 95/100 GSMW
Le Grand Domaine, The Pledge Our Old Vine Chenin Blanc 2023, Stellenbosch – 94+/100 GSMW
Predictably, the Le Riche Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon often occupies the majority of wine critics’ column inches, garnering high 90+ point scores on a seemingly regular basis… and not just from local critics either. Both the 2020 and 2021 releases have picked up scores from 97 to 99/100 points from UK as well as respected American critics. So, of course it gives me even more pleasure to review the “other” Cabernet Sauvignon produced by this iconic Stellenbosch producer.
The fruit for this “regular” Le Riche Cabernet Sauvignon was sourced from selected vineyard sites within Stellenbosch, with a conscientious mixture of cool gravelly slopes facing the cooling False Bay and rich red granitic soils located around Stellenbosch to ensure a harmonious and accessible balance of aromas and flavours in the final wine.
Le Riche Cabernet Sauvignon 2022, WO Stellenbosch, 14.23% Abv.
2.1g/l RS| 5.9g/l TA | 3.77pH
The 2022 Le Riche Cabernet Sauvignon is an attractive and sumptuous pure Cabernet Sauvignon expression brimming with perfumed fresh violets and rose petals, grilled herbs, black cherry compote, black tea and creme de cassis. There is a real fleshy tenderness to the wine that shows a deliciously accessible Cabernet fruit typicity, laced with cherry tobacco, mulberries and Black Forest gateau nuances. Medium bodied with a harmonious integrated freshness and a mouth watering salinity following to an expansive finish with majestically subtle sweet mineral tannins, this wine has everything you could possibly want from an affordable, pure fruited Stellenbosch Cabernet. Drink this beauty on release and over the next 8-10+ years.
(Wine Safari Score: 94/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Le Riche Cabernet Sauvignon 2021, WO Stellenbosch, 14.39% Abv.
1.6g/l RS| 5.4g/l TA | 3.70pH
This quintessential classically styled Stellenbosch Cabernet Sauvignon 2021 exhibits attractive aromatics of shaved lead-pencil infused with black berries, black cherry, moist tobacco, iodine and precocious fragrant notes of violets and white spring flowers over graphite and a granitic minerality. The palate is medium bodied with incredibly fine-grained tensile tannins and delectable mouthwatering acids that really bring this wine to life. After a few hours of breathing, the wine unfurls to reveal an incredibly well integrated oak profile, restrained enough to let the inky, saline crème de cassis and black cherry fruits really shine in the glass. There is an effortless sense of power, mid-palate tension and textural precision but also a delicacy and purity. Such a wonderfully fresh, vibrant, elegant expression of Cabernet Sauvignon that celebrates the charm and purity of a cooler, slower ripening vintage like 2021. A stylish classical red wine that will continue to reward the drinker for at least 10 to 15+ years after vintage. A truly affordable luxury fine wine.
(Wine Safari Score: 95+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
The Le Riche wines are imported into the UK by Boutinot Wines and are available retail from specialist South African merchants like Museum Winesfor around £22-£24 per bottle.
When Bruwer Raats set out in 2000 to champion Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc, who would have thought he would be where he is today, having claimed the premium high ground so successfully, consistently producing arguably some of South Africa’s best Chenin Blanc whites and certainly South Africa’s most respected Cabernet Franc reds. Indeed, when it comes to this once quirky Loire red cultivar, Bruwer’s Raats Family Wines Cabernet Franc and Raats Eden High Density Cabernet Franc must surely be regarded as some of the most profound Cabernet Franc expressions produced anywhere in the world today, including in the motherland region of the Loire itself.
Mini Eden Cabernet Franc vertical – 2017, 2020 and 2022.
Over the past decade, the consumer tide has certainly turned back in favour of premium Cabernet Franc, with its delicate floral perfume, subtle leafy red and black fruits, and its suave, elegant sensual texture all built around fine silky tannins and a mouth-watering acidity. The mean, green pyrazines of years gone by have been well and truly banished both in South Africa as well as across Europe where sales of Cabernet Franc wines are once again flourishing. One needs to look no further than the cultivar’s newly found planting popularity in Bolgheri and Coastal Tuscany to witness its broad international appeal in not only Bordeaux blends but in single varietal wines as well.
The UK launch tasting at La Trompette Restaurant in London.
The latest new release tasting took on extra meaning this year with the introduction of Bruwer Raats’ first new wine for almost a decade. It was of course 10 years ago with the 2014 vintage that Raats Family Wines launched the high-density single vineyard Eden Chenin Blanc and Eden Cabernet Franc, which is now finally being joined by the maiden Vlag Vineyard Selection Polkadraai Hills Cabernet Franc 2022, that Bruwer describes as “a celebration of Cabernet Franc… but executed in a new style.” The wine is a blend of two single Polkadraai Hills vineyards, one from lower slope vines planted in 2008 and one from high mid-slope vines planted in 2002. The resulting wine was aged in 33% concrete egg, 33% oak barrels (8% new French), and 33% in large foudre. The new releases are expected to retail in the UK for £75 per bottle for the Vlag and £115 per bottle for the Eden (R1,600 and R2,950 per bottle in South Africa). Both will be extremely tightly allocated as per usual.
Raats Family Wines Vlag Vineyard Selection Polkadraai Hills Cabernet Franc 2022, WO Polkadraai Hills, Stellenbosch, 13% Abv.
A fabulously rich, perfumed aromatics with plenty of fine detail, revealing an intriguing depth and power but also a crystalline clarity and purity of fruit. There is initially a subtle earthy, savoury black fruited note on opening which soon gives way to more elaborate aromas of pressed violets, cherry blossom, rose petals, thyme and hints of sandalwood and sweet cedar spice. This is an architectural masterpiece with finer lines and a more harmonious symmetry than even Enzo Ferrari could ever have conjured up. Beautifully weightless and texturally caressing in the mouth, the tannins are grippy, incredibly fine grained, but equally silky soft, balancing the complex layers of saline cassis, red currant, and red cherry fruit concentration to perfection. A wine with not only incredible precision but also a vibrant energy that is brought to life by seamlessly integrated zippy acids. Quite simply, this wine is an absolute pleasure to sip and savour. Not quite an iron fist in a velvet glove, but certainly an impressively powerful tannin profile combined with a majestic fruit purity. A Cabernet Franc for Cote Rotie drinkers? Maybe. Drink on release and over the next 10 to 15+ years.
(Wine Safari Score: 96/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Raats Family Wines Eden High-Density Single Vineyard Cabernet Franc 2022, WO Polkadraai Hills, Stellenbosch, 13% Abv.
The Eden 2022 is another ultra confident showstopper from Bruwer Raats’ tiny 0.2-hectare vineyard. This pristine Eden Cabernet Franc displays the most tantalising intensity and florality on the nose with a notable depth, seductive power and a piercing perfume focus. High toned, lifted and utterly beguiling, the aromatics display an exotic fanned peacock’s tail of pressed violets, cherry blossom and dried lavender over notes of oregano, dried thyme, sweet cherry compote, saline crème de cassis, oystershell, pencil shavings and delicate blueberry rock candy nuances. The palate is always underpinned by incredibly fine tannins but with this 2022, the vivacity, concentration and freshness of the accompanying acids bring immeasurable joy to the palate, seamlessly counterbalancing the complex red and black berry fruit intensity. This wine is all about purity, precision, and persistence, with a mouthfeel texture of silk and the most polished fine-grained granitic mineral tannins imaginable. This is surely as close as you are going to get to perfection with a young, energetic, premium Cabernet Franc in South Africa? Drink on release an over the next 10 to 15+ years. (598 bottles produced.)
Always exciting to taste and review new producer’s wines. I’d heard of the Dorper wines but until now had not yet tasted any, so was very pleased to sit down with their white Chenin Blanc and their Pinotage red both from the newly released 2022 vintage.
Dorper is the own label started by winemaker Reg Holder, previously of Delheim winery but who is now also running Lautus De-Alcoholised Wines. The name comes from the Afrikaans word for “dorp” or small town following a philosophy to use small old vine vineyards in and around Stellenbosch town itself that reflect a certain sense of terroir and place.
Dorper Chenin Blanc 2022, WO Stellenbosch, 13% Abv.
This is impressive Chenin Blanc from a blend of vineyards in and around the Bottelary Hills in Stellenbosch that were fermented and aged in old oak barrels. The aromatics show an archetypal wet river stone, granitic mineral aromatics intertwined with notes of crunchy pear, white peach, wet hay, and dried herbs with subtle hints of dry bushveld after early summer rains. With a modest 13% alcohol, the palate displays a very decent depth of fruit and glycerol weight in the mouth with yet more wet stone liquid minerality, green pear, pithy apple skins and delicate white citrus nuances. One of the highlights is undoubtedly the wine’s deliciously vibrant tangy acids that carry the mineral laden fruits with notable length on the finish. Quite a serious, grown-up expression of Chenin Blanc for sure. Drink on releases and over 8 to 10+ years.
(Wine Safari Score: 93+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Dorper Pinotage 2022, WO Stellenbosch, 13.5% Abv.
1.8g/l RS | 5.3g/l TA | 3.75pH
This is another Pinotage expression that helps trumpet the stylistic revolution that this cultivar has undergone over the past decade. Made from fruit sourced from two old vine parcels, one grown on decomposed granite soils in the Helderberg and the other on shale soils in the Bottelary Hills, the grapes were destemmed but not crushed, using a portion of whole bunches, this is a lively, perfumed, energetic Pinotage with complex floral aromatics of black and blueberry fruits, hints of black cherry, cranberry and saline crème de cassis nuances. A real cornucopia of flavours and texture, but always siding with fine grained, elegant tannins supported by the most delicious tangy sweet-sour acids. A wine very much centred around the purity of the fruit and the mid-palate harmony with just the most subtle wood spice notes on the dry mineral finish. A complete pleasure to drink! Drink now and over 5-8+ years.
(Wine Safari Score: 94/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
The wines are imported into the UK and are available to trade from Graft Wines.
Change does not come a knocking too often at iconic estates like Meerlust or Kanonkop. Indeed, these iconic South African heritage estates could fit all their past and present winemakers around one small table in the corner of a good Stellenbosch steak house restaurant and still have a few spare seats. So with the iconic 2021 vintage, we see a bold wine that Meerlust winemaker Wim Truter was solely in charge of without any influence from predecessors.
When I last visited Meerlust a few years ago, I was driven around the expansive property which boasts 65 hectares under vines but I also saw some of the 20 hectares of new plantings that will be coming on stream in the next few years. The Meerlust Estate, held in trust, certainly is not letting the grass grow under its feet.
While winemaker Wim Truter surely knew what he was taking on by applying to be the successor to Chris Williams, he seems to have settled in very nicely thank you… and most people I have spoken to in the fine wine trade feel he is more than adequately equipped and resourced to produce some very exciting wines from this iconic estate. Look out for the Rubicon 2021, which looks set to be release in the UK later in the year but which is already available in the local market.
Meerlust Rubicon Cape Bordeaux Blend 2021, WO Stellenbosch, 14% Abv.
A blend of 48% Cabernet Sauvignon, 46% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc and 1% Petit Verdot aged 18 months in 300-litre barrels, 60% new, this impressive 2021 represents one of the most exciting Rubicon releases since the 2015 and 2017 vintages. The aromatics are mineral and spicy underpinned by layers of blueberry and black berry fruits, salty black liquorice, graphite pencil and sweet sappy cedar, sandalwood and a subtle tobacco leaf spice. Beautifully constructed, the palate is taut but tensile, tightly wound, tight knit and polished, displaying impressive stony polished marble tannins but also a great core of energy. The textural precision is notable showing power, focus and a piercing black cherry and saline black currant intensity with a kiss of nori kelp, grilled herbs and iodine on the long finish. This is a fine wine collectors will want to bury away in their cellars for 5 to 8 years to allow the wine to unfurl further and put on a bit more palate weight. But all the requisite components for another truly classic Rubicon are present. I’ve not been this excited about a new Rubicon release for a long time! Congrats to the whole Meerlust team. (21,000 cases of 6 produced)
Gyles Webb bought an old fruit orchard farm in 1983 after giving up his accounting career in Natal to pursue wine farming in the Cape. The old manor house was restored and the first wines under the Thelema Mountain Vineyards label were released in 1988. By the mid 1990’s Thelema’s wines sold out within a month after release, making it one of the most sought-after wine estates in South Africa.
Forever cemented as one of the Cape Wineland’s iconic wineries, the wider wine press attention in the noughties did somewhat shift away from the classical estates like Thelema towards the swathe of new up and coming exciting young gun producers primarily located in the Swartland.
Thomas Webb, the next generation in charge at Thelema.
But the classics always remain special and in the past decade, the wider global wine market has seen a massive refocus back on to the classical names that once helped re-establish the modern post-apartheid Cape wine industry. Thelema is just one of these wineries and their new releases under the stewardship of Thomas Webb are certainly worth a lot of attention! I caught up with Thomas in London recently and tasted through a superb selection of new vintages.
Thelema Mountain Vineyards Sauvignon Blanc 2022
Vibrant, crystalline and fresh with bright acids, notes of lime peel and green passion fruit and a hint of green apple on the mouth watering finish. Beautifully lifted, pure fruited with a chalky density and impressive fruity, fleshy concentration despite being below <2g/l RS. A premium Sauvignon Blanc for drinkers who perhaps don’t like the more pungent grassy styles.
Made 100% from mountainside vineyards offering a fulsome expression, rich and plush with a certain comforting opulence, boasting sweet lemon cordial, salted toffee, nutty pistachio and savoury biscuit notes. The palate shows impressive intensity with salty maritime notes, bright tangy acids with lemon grass, lime cordial nuances and a cool, mineral, drying finish. Really very smart.
(Wine Safari Score: 94/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Thelema Mountain Vineyards Chardonnay 2021, WO Stellenbosch, 13% Abv.
The new release 2021 Thelema Chardonnay possesses a beautifully pale lemon lime canary yellow with a fabulous shimmering brightness to it and is a very enticing Chardonnay offering indeed. The initial aromatics are full of dried green herbs, sweet lemon and lime citrus, tart pineapple and a most seductive vanilla pod hint that is seamlessly integrated into the wine. The classy oaking is equally evident on the palate but kept well in check by authoritative 2021 vintage acids, a stony granitic mineral frame, all tempered by tart crystalline white citrus fruits, white peach, green apple and a tangy fresh concentrated finish where another hint of tart pineapple makes an appearance. A truly classy wine from this phenomenal 2021 red and white vintage in South Africa, it shows its regal class and precision with such purity and clarity combined with intensity. One of the best Chardonnays from Thelema in more than a decade. Drink on release and over the next 8 to 10 years.
(Wine Safari Score: 95+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Thelema Mountain Vineyards Merlot 2020, 14% Abv.
Beautifully sweet fruited with aromatics of sappy cedar spice infused with black plum, black berry compote, dried baking herbs and a dusty granitic minerality. The palate is soft, sweet fruited and piquant with a supple fleshy texture, silky accessible tannins over subtle tobacco leaf, hoisin plum sauce, cigar wrapper and a cedar wood spice finish. A classy pure varietal expression of Merlot.
(Wine Safari Score: 92+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Thelema Mountain Vineyards Merlot Reserve 2021, WO Stellenbosch
The Reserve Merlot displays a delicate aromatic array of potpourri, dried violets, bouquet garni and incense together with hints of red currant, dried cranberries and red plum nuances. The palate shows a tender, seductive elegance, linear acids, and a taut freshness, that belies a sleek, incredibly subtle, cool fruited elegance. There are hints of sweet cedar, baking herbs and very fine grained stony mineral tannins that really steer this wine in a wonderfully old world Bordeaux – St Emilion direction from a cooler vintage of minerality, restraint and structure. This is a simply spellbinding wine with a tight knit texture, a phenomenal purity and an elegance of note. If you can’t afford £100+ Bordeaux right bank reds, this beauty will go a long way to fill this gap. Drink from 2024 to 2036+.
This classy Cabernet shows a spicy, piquant inky aromatics laced with layers of iodine, cedar spice, tobacco leaf and sweet black tea. The balance and texture on the palate is super classy with silky sweet tannins, plump opulent red and black berry fruits, sweet tobacco, graphite and a supple, long, intense finish enlivened by tangy acids. Very classy and classical Stellenbosch Cabernet Sauvignon but approachable now.
(Wine Safari Score: 94/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Thelema Mountain Vineyards The Mint Cabernet Sauvignon 2021
A lush, plush opulent aromatics kissed with its signature minty leafy nuances over resinous menthol blackcurrant boiled candied sweets. Very sleek and fine boned on the palate, this is a beautifully supple, soft wine showing a silky elegance with finely balanced sweet tannins, tangy bright acids, and salty cassis intensity capped with a kiss of mint choc peppermint crisp complexity on the finish. A great returning vintage for the fabled Thelema Mint Cabernet!
2007 was the first vintage released commercially to the market after Giles Webb resigned from the CIWG where the wine was normally destined. The 2020 expression is majestically complex and soft spoken, orchestral and refined with real precision, focus and textural poise. Beautifully earthy and perfumed with sweet violets, tilled earth, liquorice and salty black currant before a soft, silky, tangy palate loaded with black cherry kirsch liquor, saline cassis and a pure, long, intense classical finish. True class!
(Wine Safari Score: 95+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Thelema Mountain Vineyards Vin de Hel Dessert Muscat 2021
Made from 1 hectare of 37 year old vine Muscat (de Frontignan), picked at 35 balling to hit 149-150g/l RS with a TA of circa 5.7g/l. Grapey, fresh and vibrant on the nose with layers of lychee, rose petals, peach puree and quince jelly. Beautifully fresh, pure and utterly delicious. This is a very attractive but not overly sweet dessert style wine.
(Wine Safari Score: 93/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
The Thelema crest.
The Thelema wines are imported into the UK by Enotria Wines.
I first tasted some of the exceptional negociant-styled wines from South African merchant Wade Bales a few years ago when Cape Wine Master Wini Bowman introduced me to his notable white Sauvignon Blanc / Semillon Blend and his Stellenbosch Cabernet Sauvignon, which was awarded a Platter 5 Star gong.
So, having a brief background on Wade’s wines, I was pleased to meet up with him again recently in London to taste two of his follow-up releases.
Wade has over two decades of experience criss-crossing the Cape winelands in search of the very best wines and having forged longstanding relationships with some of the Cape’s top wine estates and winemakers, Wade’s mission is to find great South Africa wines and bring them straight to his clients’ tables.
The list of participating wineries contributing to the Wade Bales Stellenbosch Cabernet Sauvignon blend reads like a veritable who’s who of the Cape wine industry, assuring a very high level of quality every release. Ground breaking, innovative, and impressively well crafted, these are definitely fine wines worth seeking out if you’re a true Stellenbosch terroir lover.
Wade Bales Cabernet Sauvignon 2019, WO Stellenbosch, 13.5% Abv.
Classically powerful heady nose of pure Cabernet Sauvignon with all the telltale Stellenbosch notes of earthy black currant, black plum, dried violets, black tea, wet tobacco and classic freshly tilled earth nuances. Incredibly intense and focused on the palate, the 2019 is concentrated and piercing with a deliciously mouthwatering acidity and a deep broody earthy red and black berry fruited depth. The texture is intense, powerful but very fine grained and polished with sweet silky tannins and a really generous harmonious elegance. Creamy with a densely packed mid palate, the finish is long, pure and opulent. Plenty of underlying focus and power make for a very serious offering indeed! Drink on release and over the next 10-15+ years.
(Wine Safari Score: 95+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
Wade Bales Cabernet Sauvignon 2020, WO Stellenbosch, 14% Abv.
A full and generous aromatics show ripe red and black orchard fruit notes over sweet violets, peaty earth, cedar wood spice, wet tobacco and black currant nuances. Plummy and full on the entry, the palate is fleshy, full bodied, opulent and very fruit forward with sweet round tannins, tangy soft acids and a broad, sumptuous mouth-filling finish. Accessible and ready to go now, this should improve in bottle for a good 5 to 8+ years and drink well for over 15 years.
(Wine Safari Score: 94+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
For further information, contact Wade Bales on: wade@wadebales.co.za
The Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon from Le Riche Wines represents a veritable masterclass in the art of blending specially selected Stellenbosch terroirs from vines grown on decomposed granitic soils, sandy/loamy duplex gravels and deep clay rich oakleaf soils on the Simonsberg mountain range. Vintage after vintage, the Le Riche family, starting with father Etienne, and now continuing more latterly with Christo, have consistently produced some of the finest and most noteworthy single varietal Cabernet Sauvignons in the Cape… and finally, the world is waking up to this phenomenon.
This year’s Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 2021 is a vineyard blend of grapes sourced from around Stellenbosch, including 67% Helderberg, 22% Simonsberg and 11% Jonkershoek Valley, which were matured in 70% new French oak for 24 months. (Helderberg Coastal, three vineyards; Simonsberg-Stellenbosch Single Vineyard; Jonkershoek Valley Single Vineyard).
As Christo reiterates, Reserve status is only endowed if the grapes and the resulting wine measures up to exceptional standards. Hand selected grapes from older, lower yielding vines are generally used and fermentation is done with a selected yeast strain under controlled temperatures. Manual plunging during this period ensures optimal colour extraction. After seven days the tanks are closed and allowed to macerate for a further period, normally 10-14 days. Pressing follows and the wine is transferred to barrel for a natural secondary malolactic fermentation. After a year in barrel, the individual batches are blended to form the final wine and returned to barrel for another year before being bottled unfined and unfiltered. The wines are matured in bottle for one year before global release.
Le Riche Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 2021, WO Stellenbosch, 14.5% Abv.
1.9g/l RS | 5.7g/l TA | 3.79pH
This highly anticipated 2021 release comes hard on the heals of the highly rated 2020 and 2019 from Christo Le Riche, and the impressive 2021 completes the trilogy of block buster vintages from this Cabernet specialist. Unwinding in the glass, the aromatics show delicately musky, perfumed notes of white flowers, crème de cassis, blueberries, black berries and freshly tilled earth hints that mingle with notions of dried herbs, thyme and fresh mint leaf, dried peach skins over graphite, granite dust and delicate dark chocolate cocoa spice nuances. The palate is beautifully silky and creamy, full and broad yet velvety soft and plush, voluminous but delicately elegant, finely detailed and weightlessly concentrated. Tight and compact, seductively seamless in the truest sense with an incredibly integrated acid fruit balance, a lively purity, and supple sweet tannins on the long, piercing finish. If 2019 had the muscle and power and 2020 the seductive elegance, balance, and accessibility, the 2021 is a stand apart expression, as unique as the vintage itself. Simply sublime, awesome even, and most definitely a vintage that will come to define premium quality Cabernet for years to come. A true classic that will richly reward bottle ageing. Drink on release and over the next 20 to 30+ years.
(Wine Safari Score: 98+/100 Greg Sherwood MW)
The Le Riche wines are available to UK wine trade from Boutinot Wines and to consumers from Museum Wines.
