Stellenbosch @ Summer Place

Albert Ahrens who lives on Cordoba in a corner of the Helderberg and makes wine in the Swartland and the Bottelary Hills asked the R64,000 question this evening. Should Stellenbosch at Summer Place, the most lavish regional wine show in SA, arrange tasting tables by cultivar and style as they currently do, or by geography?  Which strikes at the roots of the terroir argument.  Should all wines on the show be WO Stellenbosch which they clearly weren’t?  “I’d love to make a range of Bottelary Hills wines” admitted Albert.  Maybe called BOB – Bottle of Bottelary – with one possible logo shown below. Guaranteed to be a hit at the Gugulethu and Soweto Wine Festivals, although how they would play in Durbanville is dodgy.

Maybe he could ask Stellenbosch design denizens Fanakalo to condense the above down to a pair of black TV-style spectacles. Anyway, Albert (below, left) and Henry Kotze from Morgenster are delivering some of the most piquant terroir tipples from Oak City.  Henry’s Nabucco 2010 Nebbiolo is a real Rembrandt of a wine with leafy golden tobacco flavours aplenty while Albert’s Goede Hoop Merlot 2009 is grippy and savoury and a total bargain at R65.  With a pair of black plastic glasses, this wine could be the hit of Mangaung next month.