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Cape Wine 2012 kicked off with a geselige Ghoema-Ghoema sokkie (relaxed cocktail party) at the Cape Town Breakwater this evening. Gangnam-style dancers in Roland Peens white hats and minors dressed as miners threw mini-breakdance shapes as invited guests crowded the Pinot Noir stand while the Pinotage precinct was deserted, confirming the height of the hill the local varietal has to climb.
The situational variables at Vaughan Johnson’s Waterfront wine emporium have improved immeasurably since Millpark baker Vovo Telo opened their shop next door. Now wafts of freshly baked brioche float through the cellar to such an extent that it smells like a Champagne bar. VJ (below) is off to Burgundy tomorrow but before he left he was singing the praises of Lormarins Optima 2008, a Cabernet/Merlot blend he sells for R132 a bottle.
With less than two weeks remaining before Jörg Pfützner unleashes his Big Bottle Festival on Friday 24th at the Cellars-Hohenort in Constantia, Cape Town hipsters have taken to using big bottles to train their biceps for pouring. Here is David Cope from Alphabetical training at Clarke’s on Bree Street yesterday.
Amazing what you learn from the Weekend Financial Times. Sunday’s interview with avant garde film director John Waters produced “balloonies, or people with a sexual interest in balloons.” “I really don’t get it” opined John “but maybe I’m being stuffy. It’s safe. We should encourage that kind of behaviour. No one gets pregnant at a balloony party.”
There’s a black south-easter howling through the Cape winelands at the minute: exports are in the toilet, marketers are in denial and an unsympathetic government is threatening to ban alcohol advertising. Nature has been turned upside down and vines are budding in the middle of winter. Things are now so bad, estate owners are even attempting to resuscitate their moribund Estate Owners Association, hoping that terroir will save sales.
Those omens are not peachy: at a meeting last week, the age of attendees read like the residual sugar in a line-up of those NLHs that no one buys anymore. Marketing is the only solution, manne. An unpleasant nettle that has been grasped by the young guns of Elgin who hosted an Elegantly Elgin slap-up dinner and wine pairing last night at Aubergine in the shadow of Parliament. Arranged by that circus master to the best cellars, Jörg Pfützner, fortune favoured the brave and the former apple appies set themselves up against some of the biggest names from France: Arumdale takes on Valandraud; Cluver v. Chablis; Oak Valley against the world and Elgin rarely played second fiddle.
Elegantly Paul Cluver
When I stumbled out of The Greenhouse at the Cellars Hohenort sometime this morning, I was feeling decidedly unfresh. And so ended the first day’s proceedings at the Constantia Fresh Festival. It was clearly time to leave when Harry Haddon threatened to reprise Nena’s German protest song 99 Luftballons when he found out the Haut-Batailley nine litre hailed from the 1999 vintage. The same vintage as the Buitenverwachting Christine. The HB was a last minute replacement for a six litre Pomerol 2000 Château Petit Village which was also less then fresh – in fact it was downright corked – a fact our host Jörg Pfützner from Fine Wine Events, told everyone at least twice.
Jörg Pfützner on the floor
With SA wine facing its toughest vintage since many winemakers were forcibly relocated to St. Helena at the end of the Boer War, another wine competition rolls onto the scene: Top 100 SA Wines. Which as advertised, aims to choose the top 100 SA wines. The brain child of St. James-based entrepreneur Robin von Holdt, this is far more than a competition.
The Guardian’s scoop on a restaurant that puts wine before food is old hat to regulars of Capelands, Johann Innerhofer’s vinous oasis next to Waterkloof in Somerset West. Much to the disgust of Air France and their cavernous Airbus 380 flying less than full between SA and l’Hexagone, it is not necessary to visit Il Vino d’Enrico Bernardo in Paris, a restaurant owned by the World’s Best Sommelier (vintage 2004) of the same name, to find somewhere to drink and then eat.
The World’s Best Punctuated Sommelier (all vintages) Jörg Pfützner came up with Capelands earlier this year through his links in the deeply entrenched German speaking mafia of Somerset West and environs. Too late to make the tight deadline of René Steiner’s Golf und Wein magazine, my thought’s on Johann’s winelist.
Jörg, Johann, Alex Dale and Sebastian's ear
Calling your association for the advancement of Riesling, Just Riesling, could be interpreted as being a tad reactionary. While some might say it’s a cunning plan to appropriate the initials JR shared by the three rainmakers of SA wine (Constellation’s James Reid, purple pager Jancis Robinson and king of luxury Johann Rupert), others say it’s to make the point that it’s not Crouchen Blanc, just Riesling. But I would say its following in the footsteps of the most famous residence of Simon’s Town, Just Nuisance, a Great Dane, who has his own look-alike competition held in the seaside town every April 1. A real dog show.
Neither was it cultural cringe that saw the inaugural competition be held in London, judged by three English roses (out of eight invited judges): Angela, Fiona and Julia, Miss Havishams of Hedonism all, but rather a desire to drop SA Riesling onto the international stage without breaking it. The result was a Boland Beauty: De Wetshof 2009 from deepest Robertson, placed first among 16 entries in the dry category. But how strange that the competition was not held in Cape Town, as some of Riesling’s serious heavy hitters were in town to celebrate the first birthday of the One&Only with Jörg Pfützner.
The bar has suddenly been raised for next Thursday’s lunch at La Colombe in the Constantia Winelands to launch the wine portfolio of Fons and Marianne Aaldering with the news that The Dove has shot up 26 places in the annual San Pellegrino list of Top 50 eateries. The Aalderings, hot favourites to grab poll position in the annual Platter sighted wine guide, nudging ahead of Aan de Doorns by an “m”, clearly know their foie gras from their goose liver.
Luke Dale-Roberts and Jörg and Claire Pfützner
