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Is SA wine serious about China? The list of 27 exhibitors at next week’s VinExpo in Hong Kong – or Hong Kok as my dyslexic friend Pinky calls it (with Bang Kong presumably the capital of Thailand) concentrates very much on terroir by truck wines. Commercial wines sold mainly on price.
Where are the terroir treasures, the Kanonkops, Vergelegens and Meerlusts? Not a single one of the controversial UCT Top Twenty wineries are attending, although UCT’s self-appointed professor of wine, Tim James, has at last done the decent thing and signed up for a non-UCT e-mail with which to communicate with the industry. Perhaps the Platter guide will send Professor Tim east to present this year’s 5* stunners in the next chapter of the unseemly commercial luv-in between the guide and WOSA, the exporters’ mouthpiece.
The Sanhedrin of SA wine expanded by 15 last night as the Commanderie de Bordeaux intronized the latest batch of Bordeaux worshippers at a glittering function at De Grendel. Sir David Graaff and De Grendel winemaker Chas Hopkins had a home team advantage and their Koetshuis CWG was nailed at the Bordeaux-style tasting afterwards by Arthur McWilliam Smith whose laser-like taste buds detected the serious Sémillon component, as did mining financier Gerard Holden who was amused to be addressed in the Afrikaans fashion: Gheritt rather than Jerard. He flew down to Cape Town from London yesterday, especially to join in.
The UCT Top 20 poll of SA wineries as reported in the Mail & Guardian today speaks way more to the competence and conflicts of interest of the judges than in does about SA wine quality. The poll was solicited on the digital equivalent of a UCT letter head: sent from an academic e-mail account with a UCT office telephone number by a member of the staff of that institution – that infamous barefoot agent provocateur Tim James. I refused to participate for various reasons. If bag had a sense of humour, I’d say today’s poll was Sunday’s list and the real one would be revealed later.
While our own much loved Sunday Times becomes less and less interested in wine (was it last week or the week before that there was nothing at all about vino?) the British weekly The Spectator is moving in the opposite direction. Bruce Anderson pops up with a full page column while Simon Hoggart runs the 2/3-page Spectator Mini-Bar. Which last week reported that Cape Point Vineyards winemaker Duncan Savage was “widely regarded as the leading white wine maker in South Africa” before lifting off in flights of hairy hyperbole about Duncan’s CPV Sauvignon Blanc 2010.
Duncan the Great
If last year was an annus horribilis for WOSA, 2012 is starting off even worse for Stellenbosch spin doctors with an elegant evisceration of the embattled organization by Richemont chairman Dr. Johann Rupert at the annual Vinpro Information Day on Thursday
As JPR said “Ek glo WOSA doen fenomenale werk, maar mense koop nie wyn as gevolg van biodiversiteit nie.” After praising the phenomenal job that WOSA is doing, Johann trashes the flagship project they have spent millions on. That WOSA senior management was not present to explain their strategies to concerned producers confirms the increasing irrelevance of the organization. With the WOSA R25 million annual budget essentially frittered away (the latest disaster is bringing sommeliers to SA who will not buy a single bottle when they go home as the restaurant owner places the orders), the challenge for the industry is to protect sales made within SA.
Pommes can be forgiven for always talking about the weather when hill walkers were braving 165mph breezes yesterday and the Met Office issued a red warning after a “weather bomb” saw air pressures drop 44mb in 24 hours. Wedderwill means being at the mercy of the weather, which is pretty much the status quo for this biodynamic producer atop the hill above Sir Lowry’s Village. “Gale force winds” are an understatement, according to winemaker Nico Vermuelen while GM Wolfgang von Loeper recounts horror stories of driving through raging bush fires which have plagued this windy corner of the winelands for the last couple of years. Extreme winemaking indeed.
Wolfgang von Loeper
The back label of the Stellenbosch Ridge 2009 Bordeaux-style blend (the classic varietals minus Cabernet Franc which winemaker Coenie Snyman does not like and so did not include on account of its “steeliness”) says it all: “Stellenbosch is unique in that it is the centre of fine wine, academia and culture in South Africa… Stellenbosch is birthplace and home to many of South Africa’s greatest leaders, intellectuals, artists, scientists, sportsmen and winemakers.”
Coenie Snyman and Jean Engelbrecht
Overberg and Somerset West wine producers have to pick up the pieces from a PR fiasco today after the last day of the three day Wines2Whales mountain bike race from Lourensford to Onrus was cancelled due to inclement weather on Sunday. As one participant from the UK put it “conditions on Sunday are what we have to deal with every day. It cost us a fortune to fly out here and then to have the race cut short leaves us feeling bitterly disappointed.”
As does the R1300 taxi fare from the Arabella on Bot River lagoon to La Colombe for a commiseration lunch. At least he didn’t fall for the taxi driver’s offer of waiting for three hours and carrying on to the airport for the special price of R2,500.00. R400 for Excite was a far better deal and confirms that SA wine tourism still has a lot to learn. But what a lunch – fabulous foie gras and Alaskan crab to die for, washed down by a bottle of Beaumont Hope Marguerite Chenin Blanc 2010 for R90 in a restaurant that will surely top the Eat Out list if there is any justice left in SA.
WOSA (Wines of SA, the exporters’ mouthpiece) CEO Su Birch could be in for a warm reception at the controversial Wine Futures Conference in Hong Kong next month after her comments in Crush! magazine that China is not one of her favourite tourist destinations.
Q: “Of all the places you go to on business, which one would you most like to return to, and why?”
A: “Almost everywhere, except China. I love art, architecture, watching people, mountains, forests and water so I am happy almost everywhere”.
Octogenarian Spatz Sperling of Delheim calls the current state of SA wine the worst he’s seen in 60 years of farming in the Cape. Producers are being squeezed until their pips squeak as exports tank and whisky whacks bragging brands in bars and nightclubs. One man’s meat etc. means this is music to the ears of canny consumers as quality has never been better. Last month I vouchsafed my summer drinking options for both hedonist and hoarder to the readers of the Financial Mail.
Kevin Joseph and Peter Finlayson
