Description
Very much sui generis, this impressive Cabernet Sauvignon is a great wine to put into a blind tasting. Made with fruit from two single vineyards, it’s youthful, stony, grippy and compact with considerable depth and intensity, fresh acidity, fine 20% new oak and inky damson and blackcurrant fruit. 2022-30 94/100 Tim Atkin MW
” Excellent” – Neal Martin, Vinous.com…. “Is this the best Cab Sauvignon in South Africa right now? Yes.” Natasha Hughes MW Beautiful blackcurrant, red currant, graphite, a hint of tar, minerality, complex notes of wood and fruit, some tobacco leaf and cedar. What’s exciting is that we have now experienced several vintages, and they all have an amazing quality, and it’s something unique to this terroir. It might be half the price of some of those ‘trophy’ wines, but this is the genuine star of the scene.
The Vineyards
Main Road and Dignity Our farm is in the cooler Hemel-en-Aarde Valley. The soils are granite based, and our vineyards are positioned mid slope at an elevation of 850ft. The cold South Atlantic Ocean is 5km away and acts as a giant air-conditioner. This 100% cab bears the name of its two vineyards, each registered as a Single Vineyard. Slopes are north, east and west facing. Shallow top soils vary from light, well drained gravel to mineral-rich koffie klip (coffee stone). Below this is decomposed granite clay.
Vinification
Select parcels were hand-picked over a period of 4-5 weeks in March and April. After a light destemming, the grapes were naturally fermented in small, open top oak vats. One or two short punchdowns a day kept the skins healthy whilst the various strains of indigenous yeasts got to work. After a long maceration, the skins were pressed in our old wooden basket press. The wine then went into French oak barriques (20% new), where it was raised sur lie and undisturbed for 21 months. It was then racked from barrel and allowed a few more months to integrate before being bottled, no fining. The wine was then bottle aged for a further two years before release.
