52 Shades of Green

The category for the Diners Club Young Winemaker of the Year competition this year is “white wine” and so this morning we tasted our way through 52 of them. Move over “52 shades of grey” – in SA it’s 52 shades of green as the entries were dominated by Sauvignon Blanc. I forgot to put the memory card back into my Canon G15, so here is the view from the Roche stoep last night.

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Does Sauvignon make the most boring whites in SA? This seems to be the message from the judges who included Carrie Adams who earlier this month was choosing a Top Ten of Sauvignons Blanc for FNB. For our final 10 were dominated by Chardonnay and Chenin Blanc. Is Sauvignon Blanc a Special Olympics grape? Would FNB be far better off sponsoring a Chardonnay Competition? Is the Sauvignon Blanc Interest Group deeply uninteresting?

Over a mushroom risotto lunch, we tasted some of the entries and I was blown away by the KWV Viognier, Semillon and Chenin Blanc plus the Limestone Hill from De Wetshof. The results will be announced on November 30 at a slap up black tie blow-out at La Residence in Franschhoek. Will Sir Elton John be there to tinkle the ivories, I hear you wonder? I wouldn’t bet against Izele van Blerk, Kobus van der Merwe and Peter de Wet winning Young Winemaker of the Year.