|
This tasting was dedicated to the Pinotage grape. Pinotage is
a unique varietal with its origins going back to 1924 in South
Africa when Pinot Noir and Cinsault (locally known as Hermitage)
grapes were crossed.
One
of the great benefits of being a member of the South World
Wine Society is to taste these wines, which all but one are not
available for purchase in BC. The wines selected for this evening
are well recognized internationally and many are among the Cape's
Top Performers as ranked in the John Platter Guide.
Our
reception wine was a Libertas Chenin Blanc which had a refreshing
full aroma of ripe pears. Our speaker, Dr. van Vuuren had noted
that the Chenin Blanc grape has been used for brandy production
in South Africa in the past.
Hennie
began the tasting by giving us some background on the birth of
the Pinotage grape, discussing the two grapes which were crossed
for this varietal. The Pinot Noir grape is not very hardy in South
Africa compared to Cinsault. Cinsault on the other hand does not
have the flavour of Pinot Noir. Crossing the two grapes would
hopefully extract the best aspects of both grapes. Hennie had
mentioned that from the crossing of these two varieties, 6 viable
Pinotage seeds were produced, and these 6 seeds have populated
the Pinotage vineyards of South Africa.
 The
Pinotage wines were mainly full bodied, with deep colour. Bouquets
varied from sweet, dried fruit to barnyard, leather and oak. Taste
covered spicy, oaky, plums, bacon, fruit and tannic.
A few wines stood out amongst the group. The Beaumont was quite
different in that it had a very fruity bouquet with lots of fruit
and cherries in the taste. It was a very easy to drink wine with
no tannic aftertaste. Three wines which all rated highly in our
favorite wine votes were the Fairview Amos, L'Avenir Estate and
the Kanonkop Estate wines. The factor that all three of these
wines had in common was a barnyard bouquet. While not overpowering,
the bouquet brought in additional complexity to these wines.
 The
Kanonkop Estate also is known for making Pinotage world famous.
Of all the wines, the Kanonkop had the most prominent barnyard
bouqet. There was also leather in the bouquet. One comment from
the group was how well this wine went with lamb. For those people
that have not attended one of our tastings, we are served very
flavourful appetizers from the restaurant. We all try the wines
on their own and then with food. Sometimes a wine on it's own
may not be remarkable, but when paired with a certain food, the
wine shines. It was remarked that the Fairview Amos wine would
be a very good food wine also. It's bouquet had barnyard, plum,
bacon and light oak. The taste was oaky, spicy, smoky with soft
tannins.
A
suprise wine was poured at the end of the tasting. Dr. van Vuuren
and the rest of the attendees were asked to guess the age of the
wine. A few guessed 10 years old, but it was revealed that this
Pinotage was from 1970! It held up very well over the past
32 years. The wine was Paarl Selected Pinotage. It had a brickish
colour, with a barnyard and stewed prunes bouquet. The flavour
of the wine was very much like port.
 Tasting
Selection
Our favourite Pinotage wines are:
1. L'Avenir Estate 1999
2. Kanonkop Estate 1998
|
