Honeybunch Chenin Blanc

Shellfish, Spicy food, Lean fish, Mild and soft cheese

The 2022 vintage saw a cool lead up to harvest with the first “honey bunches” being harvested on the 22nd of February and the last being harvested on the 1st of March. Yields were good and the cooler weather allowed for a good percentage of botrytis to grow, around 6% of bunches. This wine is made from a 35 year old registered single vineyard, the oldest on the property. The vineyard rows run from North-East to South-West and the vines are on a low single strand trellis. This row direction exposes the morning sun side to the prevailing southerly summer breezes and shelters the bunches from the harsher afternoon sun. The Honeybunch is made from the first pick through this vineyard, all the exposed bunches on the morning sun side only are harvested. They turn a golden colour as a result of their exposure to the sun and develop a unique honeyed character.

One year maturation on the heavy lees, in the same vessels before being racked and bottled.

Grapes harvested over 7 days. 12 to 15 hour maceration on the skins in the press before pressing. After an overnight settling the juice is then put into 225L and 300L French oak barrels and 2 cement eggs (around 15 percent) and fermented wild. Fermentation temperature kept between 16 and 18 degrees Celsius which slows the process down to between 4 and 8 weeks. 50 percent of the wine goes through malolactic fermentation.

“We would like people who drink our wines to experience the estate our soils our slopes our vines and our terroir. Wine should be experienced and not merely drunk and we endeavour to make every bottle of our wine a memorable experience. We believe wine is made in the vineyards and our goal is to allow the vineyards to express themselves by interfering as little as possible. As a result we have adopted a minimalist approach in both the vineyards and the cellar. The idea being to minimalise the human influence on the final product. In the vineyards we do everything by hand from pruning to harvesting. We are also proud members of the Biodiversity and Wine Initiative and of the Integrated Production of Wine Scheme. We have set aside 30% of the estate and dedicated it to the Western Capes indigenous flora and fauna. The goal in the cellar is to facilitate the production of wine from grapes and not merely manufacture wine. This is again done by following the minimalist approach of nothing added apart from a small amount of SO2 prior to bottling. All grapes are hand sorted in the cellar to remove m.o.g. (material other than grapes) and unripe grapes before they go to tank. Wild or naturally occurring yeasts are allowed to ferment the grapes before the wine is drained off the skins and allowed to mature in French oak barrels before being racked and bottled.