Reserve Collection Chardonnay

The grapes were de-stemmed, crushed and pressed to stainless steel tanks for settling overnight or whole bunch pressed after a night in the cold room with one night’s settling and subsequent racking. Only the free run juice from the best blocks is used for the Reserve Collection Chardonnay. The juice from the settled batches was then racked and run off to barrel for fermentation with selected yeast.

This Chardonnay is made from grapes grown on Tokara’s Stellenbosch farm on the slopes of the Simonsberg Mountain. The soils are all Oakleaf from granitic origin with varying levels of sandstone pebbles in the profile. It is a deep clay rich soil, with gravelly elements. The slopes vary between South-Eastern to North-Western aspects at altitudes between 300 and 360 m above sea level. The vines cropped between 6 and 7 tons per hectare. The grapes were handpicked between the 29th of January and 16th of February at optimal flavour and ripeness with sugars between 22 to 23 degrees brix.

After fermentation the wine was topped and left on the lees with regular lees stirring for 11 months. 100% of the barrels completed malolactic fermentation. The barrels were all tight grain French oak 228 litre of which 27% were new the rest were 2nd and 3rd fill barrels. The wine was bottled in February 2023.