Serenity

Beef short ribs braised in red wine and herbs.

The fruit used to make this wine was sourced from radical and individual vineyards sites with one goal in mind – to have the confidence to “whisper” style through the true expression of these sites rather than “shout” brashness through winemaking excesses. This Shiraz-based wine is a seamless blend of three classic Rhone varietals and because the emphasis is more on style than cultivar make-up, the remaining two are unnamed. Cultivars are after all merely vehicles to express terroir and not the expression of a wine itself. Consequently this wine continues to define the style introduced by the maiden 2005 vintage which has been embraced by wine aficionados all over the world.

Careful maturation in tight-grain French oak barriques, 26% of which were new, for a period of 18 months followed before the wine was bottled in December 2012. A further resting period of 36 months in bottle followed before deemed ready for release in December 2015.

The grapes were handpicked, sorted and crushed into open fermenters. Here they underwent cold maceration on their skins for seven days before completing fermentation and being pressed off to barrel where malolactic fermentation took place.

Hemel-en-Aarde is Afrikaans for “heaven and earth” and the claim is justified. Our estate sits on a particularly heavenly stretch of land beneath a lofty peak of the Babylon’s Tower mountain range. In addition to its unrelenting beauty Ataraxia is home to some of the most spectacular terroirs South Africa has to offer. In 2004 The Skyfields Farm was visioned into the Ataraxia wine label when husband and wife Kevin and Hanli Grant and a few friends purchased this 47-hectare prime vineyard property. More than a decade later we are associated with crafting wines of incredible finesse balance and depth; wines that proudly hold their own on the international wine stage.