“Like Brad Pitt stepping out of the shower” was one memorable tasting note from an early issue of WineX magazine, alas now defunct, unlike the pair of consumer wine shows of the same name from the Fridjhon stable.

What is this obsession with showers? Luca Turin’s tasting note for Kouros from another late lamented great, Yves Saint Laurent (who died in June), from his tour de force Perfumes (Profile Books, 2008): “like the tanned skin of a guy with gomina [Spanish for gel] in his hair stepping out of the shower… It has that faintly repellent clean-dirty feel of other people’s bathrooms, and manages to smell at once scrubbed and promissory of an unmade bed.”

My nomination for a SA shower wine 2008 is the savory 2007 vintage Swallow red blend of Mourvèdre and Shiraz made by Alexander Milner at Natte Valleij on the Simonsberg. Grandson of the magnificently monikered Sir Mordaunt Milner (who may sound like a character from a Gilbert & Sullivan operetta, but actually bought the farm in the sixties) and brother to Marcus who makes the wine at De Meye, Alexander certainly looks the part of a shower icon. And at R25 a glass at the Nose Winebar in the Cape Quarter, consumers are not getting hosed down.