Merlot

Ideal with lamb and other moderately rich red meat dishes, as well as rich baked pasta.

A difficult and challenging vintage. Winter started late, but we had enough cold to ensure good budbreak in spring. We had below average winter rain, but a good normal spring. An early hot summer with several heatwaves throughout the season meant lower growth and a smaller crop with small berries. The little bit of supplementary water we could apply (sooner than ever before) went a long way to help keep quality high. Harvest was our earliest ever, starting more than a week early. The hot weather and particularly warm evenings meant acidity was low and we had to pick earlier than usual.

Time in barrel 19 months, which included several rackings to gradually clarify the wine and assist maturation. The wine was bottled unfined and unfiltered by hand on the property.

Handpicking into 20 kg lugboxes. Destemming and gentle crushing directly into small 2 ton open top fermentation tanks. Spontaneous natural yeast fermentation @ max. 30°C with the cap of skins punched down manually 1-3 times a day for 10 days. Wine drained directly to barrels together with single pressing from traditional basket press. Malolactic fermentation in the barrel. 35% new French oak.

A small family winery at the end of the Upper Blaauwklippen Road in the mountains above Stellenbosch South Africa. Established in 1992 by architect David Trafford & artist wife Rita with the focus on high end red wines of great intensity & longevity using minimal intervention production methods.