What I Drank Last Night

How easy is it to tell the superlative from the super-quaffer? That was the theme of a social tasting last night. The line-up was tasted blind, my tasting notes and scores as follows: DeMorgenzon Reserve Chenin Blanc 2009 – Wine Spectator Top 100 Wines of 2011 Intense and complex. Peach, spice and some leesy notes. [...]

Is there no end to the phenomenon that is The Chocolate Block, the multi-regional red blend from acclaimed Franschhoek winery Boekenhoutskloof? The current-release 2010 vintage sees production exceed 1 000 barrels for the first time, 1 035 to be precise, and a staggering increase from the 15 barrels which were made of the maiden 2002 [...]

Things you need to know about the 32nd edition of Platter’s South African Wine Guide: colour “Karoo sun yellow with type in Atlantic blue foil”. Over 7 000 wines from more than 900 producers tasted. 45 wines rated 5 Stars (see here). Pages: 620 – 12 more than 2011 and biggest ever. Suggested retail price: [...]

45 wines out of a total of 140 nominated have earned a rating of 5 Stars in Platter’s 2012 (compared to 58 out of 150 in the 2011 edition). Of these, 19 were red, 16 were white, six were unfortified sweet wine, two were Méthode Cap Classique and two were Port. Boekenhoutskloof, Mullineux Family Wines [...]

Sales at the 27th Nedbank Cape Winemakers Guild auction held at Spier in Stellenbosch today amounted to R5 286 700, turnover up by R1.4 million from 2010. The auction attracted 122 buyers this year including 19 offshore with a total of 2 955 cases sold at an average price of R1 789 per case equivalent of [...]

On Friday, a workshop conducted by Steenberg winemaker JD Pretorius towards a better understanding of Semillon. At the end of 2010, it was the 12th most planted variety in the country with the total area amounting to 1 182.4ha (some 30% of this is planted in the Breedekloof where it’s used to dolly up entry-level [...]

Yesterday a tasting convened by Angela Lloyd for an article on the age-worthiness of modern-era South African wines to appear in an upcoming issue of WineLand. Two flights of seven wines, the first and the second red. We tasted blind with scoring done according to the 20-point system. Here’s how I rated the wines: WHITES [...]

Auctions are theoretically the best way of establishing the true market value of whatever is up for sale so what to make of turnover at the 26th annual Cape Winemakers Guild Auction completed on Saturday  coming in at R3 867 200, down 25% on 2009, which saw the highest ever sales in the auction’s history [...]

The worldwide surface area planted to Shiraz vines has gone from less than 10 000 hectares in the early 1980s to more than 150 000 hectares in 2007/2008, according to Lynne  Sheriff MW, speaking at the 2010 La Motte Shiraz Experience yesterday. Who’s going to buy the stuff ? is the question because as Sherriff [...]

A rare night out for darling and me on Thursday. After attending RMB WineX at the Cape Town International Convention Centre, we headed with intent for Bizerca Bistro and some of chef Laurent Deslandes delicious grub. For mains, darling chose the rabbit fricassee and I ordered chicken jambonnette. Something medium bodied and fresh to drink. [...]