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Wine tasters are a polite bunch on the whole, damning with faint praise or averting their gaze in really offensive cases like Queen Victoria when confronted by a lesbian. In fact the only serious wino I can think of who actively publicizes a “bad” wine is Gaetano Manti, publisher of the US edition of Il Mio Vino, which features a column “the big let down”. For example the 2001 Brunello di Montalcino Riserva 2001 from Fuligni was recently damned by IMV as having “no apparent defects, but it is very unbalanced. And fails to live up to its price-tag.”
Essentially the same criticism leveled at Dennis Kerrison’s Minotaur 2007 from Doolhof Estate in Wellington in a curious tasting note, written recently by an associate editor of a large circulation sighted wine guide. The confused posting throws question marks at the rating accorded to the wine in the 2010 edition of the guide and by implication at the (named) taster who supplied it. That the blogger is also wife of the real editor of the guide makes it all even more messy and looks suspiciously like washing dirty laundry in public. Which if the case, is grossly unfair to Dennis and his brand.
Doolhof GM Daan Coetzee and Dennis Kerrison
An e-mail from André Morgenthal, communications manager at WOSA (Wines of SA, the exporters’ mouthpiece) this morning forwarding foreign reaction to a story I ran on www.winenews.co.za on a tasting of 25 Pinotages at last month’s London Mega-Tasting. The story soon attracted over 1000 hits and many comments and rocketed to the top of the winenews pops, where it stubbornly stays. An accusation is made that I’m “always anti-WOSA” and the question is asked whether I have a grudge or am I simply anti-SA wines? A bit rich, coming two days before the launch of The People’s Guide, a blind-tasted guide to SA wines I’ve written with Michael Olivier and Aníbal Coutinho. WOSA itself obviously didn’t think the story was intended to bash them as they posted it on their website.
Saying grace before a meal is one of the most endearing of practices in the Winelands. Living Legend Dave Hughes offered up such a doozy at the Veritas Wine Awards a week ago, it attracted a smattering of applause from the audience.
KWV Cellarmaster Richard Rowe and Dave Hughes LL
Matthee van Schalkwyk, head of production at Orange River Cellars, had a question for judges of the Country Cellars Orange River Winemaker of the Year Competition at the awards dinner, held at the Fanie Malan preparatory school in Upington, on Saturday night. Translated from a richly idiomatic Afrikaans he said “we won two gold medals at the Veritas Awards last weekend for our fortified wines (a white Muscadel and red Jerepigo) and got a couple of bronze medals for our whites (Colombard and Chenin). You judges also praise our red wines – yet they do nothing in competitions.”
The highlight of Upington's social calender attracts exotic guests such as Cape Town wine personality Emile Joubert
Presented as the best of SA, this year’s crop of 41 five star stunners in the Platter sighted wine guide were probably the first port of call for the pundits, pontificators and punters who thronged the stands of the biannual WOSA London Mega-Tasting earlier this week. Peter May, the Prophet of Pinotage put in an appearance as did keen amateur golfer and comedian Tim Atkin. But organizers of Veritas who revealed their 40 Double Gold Doozies in a sweaty Cape Town Convention Centre on Saturday night might be forgiven for thinking the wrong wines were being showcased, especially when their constituency picks up the lion’s share of WOSA’s bills.
For the two sets of stunners, chosen contemporaneously, have about as much in common as Ritsema de la Bat and Amy Winehouse. There was not a single wine that appeared on both lists. Heck, even WINE magazine’s Top Ten Sauvignons announced yesterday contained one Platter five star stunner (out of the five awarded). Ten points to ponder:
KWV Cellarmaster Richard Rowe and Lorna's husband, Dave Hughes at Veritas
The highlight of Saturday night’s Veritas Awards was the induction of the first batch of Living Legends of Wine into the National Cellar of Fame at the Cape Town Convention Centre.
Living Legends waiting to be Immortalized
The Veritas Awards are the Oscars of the SA wine world and the red carpet was rolled up to make way for a seventies revival dance floor at the Cape Town International Convention Centre last night. This being the 350th birthday year of SA wine, MC Bennie Howard admitted the National Wine Show was hoping for entries from 350 cellars but ended up with 1728 wines from 299 producers. 40 achieved the highest Double Gold accolade at a series of blind tastings and one winery – Spier in Stellenbosch – was responsible for 5 of these or over 10% of the total.
Fabulous Frans Smit, Spier Cellarmaster, hard at work last night
Tired of being ripped-off by greedy boutique producers and rapacious retailers? A novel suggestion from Lammershoek, that Paardeberg larder of liquid loveliness:
“We have small parcels of the following grape varieties available to sell for the 2010 vintage: Syrah, Chenin Blanc, Viognier, Carignan, Grenache and Clairette Blanche. Please contact Paul on paul@lammershoek.co.za or 022 487 1790. Long term contracts are negotiable. Note that these grapes are responsible for the Platter 2010 White Wine of the Year as well as other 5 star and 5 star nominated wines.”
Paul Kretzel
The news that WOSA – wines of SA, the exporters’ association – is to sponsor braai festivals in key export destinations like the UK, Holland, Germany, Scandinavia, Latin America and the Far East in conjunction with next year’s 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup, comes as no surprise. The festivals “will feature high-profile South African chefs, as well as winemakers at venues where matches are being televised.”
Since all 2010 matches take place in SA, the chefs and winemakers will presumably all perform in SA so how these events will be featured in braai festivals in export destinations, key or not, confuses me. Perhaps televised doesn’t mean “recorded”, but rather “played” on those large public big screen TVs… Anyway, serving something to eat at a TV event including local talent will help Sello Maake ka-Ncube, the first black actor to go on a hunger strike protesting the SABC’s decision to cut local content.
On the subject of high-profile chefs, presumably Conrad Gallagher will be excluded. Uncorked is rooting for Afrikaans chiskop chef Nataniel, currently advertising wors on Sun City buses, to lead the battle of the braai. Dirty jokes and sausage innuendos aside, it is truly amazing to note that the SA Champion Boerewors was selected from 44 000 entries by 400 judges, presumably tasted blind. Although there were probably some seeded players with chilli and tomato pips a secret ingredient in some recipes. This makes the 1728 entries at Veritas, the results of which are to be unveiled this weekend, look very anaemic (like Nataniel) in comparison.
The Platter Five Star Stunners are out and Tim James, apologist for and associate editor of the Platter sighted wine guide claims an “overwhelming reflection of terroir on the labels of Platter five-star wines is in itself perhaps the most impressive achievement of all.”
Rubbish! – all it proves is that Platter pundits preferentially nominate terroir wines sighted. Sighted nomination sucks, especially when you have a couple of importers/retailers of Burgundy assessing SA Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, as at least one winemaker noted, ruefully.
Eben Sadie, punted by TJ as his pick for Platter Winemaker of the Year if they were to have one, makes a strong case for blends being necessary for complexity in SA wines. An observation which usually speaks against terroir as different varietals typically come from different sites unless you’re in the Douro, where everything grows in the same vineyard in merry confusion. And given the SA obsession with new wood, who’s terroir are we talking about anyway? Allier?
Donovan Rall proves the point with his 2008 vintage four way old barrel white blend of grapes from the Helderberg, Bottelary Hills and Paardeberg. His and the Dunstone Shiraz 2008 were the only two wines out of 41 to evoke any kind of surprise up here in Jozi. As one restaurateur commented “it’s now easier to get a Platter five star than a Veritas double gold.”
Donovan Rall
