Yesterday’s biggest surprise was seeing three of the movers and shakers in SA wine exports (Cape Classics CEO André Shearer in a fabulously dashing designer blazer, WOSA CEO Su Birch and her helper André Morgenthal) at the opening on a new tasting room at Oldenburg in the Banghoek Valley. But then Oldenburg owner Adrian Vanderspuy did admit he needs 80% exports to make his brave venture wash its own face. If he can get the message out there that his Cabernet Franc 2008, made from second crop grapes grown on the Rondekop vines (below), is a game changer, his export effort should be a dream rather than the nightmare SA wine exporter’s are enduring at the minute.

The Cape's Hill of Grace for Cabernet Franc

For on Monday I was playing unpaid WOSA representative to six editors of food, wine and tourism magazines and newspapers from Buenos Aires. A brilliant, but unknown, Table Bay Hotel sommelier had chosen Rainbow’s End 2009 Cabernet Franc to showcase to the Argies – a smart move given their familiarity with Malbec, another of the Famous Five varietals in Bordeaux-style blends. Rainbow’s End is the farm just above Oldenburg and those mischievous pixies seem to have filled the pot of gold beneath Rondekop with Cabernet Franc!

As I explained to the vivacious editor of Ohlala!, Banghoek Franc has all the steely sophistication of a tango and goes great with steak, a popular dish in Buenos Aires. Perhaps the Banghoek Valley should rename itself Franchoek, as its on the way to Franschhoek, which is busy reinventing itself as a cosy corner of Burgundy with the locals sporting berets and washing down Lodine Maske’s Époisses de Bourgogne with Riedel glasses full of Chamonix Pinot Noir 2010. Leaving the marketing coast clear for a Focus on Franc.

Related posts:

1. Banghoek Beauties My sidebar in Sunday’s Sunday Times elicited an e-mail from...
2. Opening the Pot of Gold Geneva-based financial gnome Adrian Van der Spuy was born on...
3. Geneva Juice Browsing the internet this morning, I nearly swallowed my veneers...
4. Wine from a Gondwanaland sibling The Argentine and South African wine industries have a lot...
5. Does Afrikaans have any immortals? Members of the Académie Française, that shady body which decides...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.