Le Riche Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve

This robust Cabernet Sauvignon pairs excellently with hearty dishes. Ideal accompaniments include grilled lamb loin chops seasoned with herbes de Provence and garlic, rosemary-braised lamb shanks, and filet mignon with a rich balsamic glaze. The wine's depth and tannic structure also complement dishes like lamb tagine and short ribs braised with mushrooms and tomatoes.

Sourced from select Stellenbosch wards: Helderberg Coastal (60%), Simonsberg-Stellenbosch (25%), Helderberg North, and Jonkershoek. The Helderberg Coastal vineyards benefit from cooling sea breezes and duplex gravely granitic soils, predominantly planted with the CS163 clone. Simonsberg-Stellenbosch contributes 25% to the blend, offering fruit from its unique terroir.

Matured for 24 months in 225-litre French oak barrels, with 72% new oak. This regimen imparts depth and complexity, contributing to the wine's structure and longevity.

Grapes undergo bunch sorting before fermentation in open-top fermenters. Extended maceration enhances the wine's age-ability. Post-fermentation, the wine is transferred to French oak barrels for malolactic fermentation. After a year, individual batches are blended and returned to barrels for another year, followed by bottling without fining or filtration.

Le Riche Wines is situated on the slopes of the Helderberg Mountain in close proximity to the historic town of Stellenbosch. The winery was designed to replicate our previous winery in Jonkershoek which was built in 1911. With old style open top concrete fermentation tanks mixed with a modern minimum intervention wine making approach the winery provides a platform to create ultra premium red wines in a classic South African style. Production is 8000—6 cases a year with the Reserve range consisting of only about 1000 cases. The wines are rare but worth sourcing. Le Riche Wines was founded by Etienne le Riche in 1996 and is now run as a family concern. Coming from an illustrious career in the South African wine industry Etienne decided to create a winery where he could express the cultivar he had grown to love and respect Cabernet Sauvignon. The approach was simple to illustrate the nuances of Stellenbosch Cabernets as best possible. Preferring not to be inhibited by estate classification he chose to select grapes from the best possible terroirs Stellenbosch had to offer. The resulting wines have shown great elegance and class consistently proving to be of superb quality and maturation potential.