At the DC Food and Wine Festival, I tried to quickly hit tables with wines I don’t get a lot of exposure to normally. I’ve had a few wines from South Africa, but not very many, so I made a beeline for the Wines of South Africa table. I felt bad for the woman pouring the wines. She didn’t speak much English, and the person really running the table had left her there without even opening the bottles for her…she didn’t seem to know how to work a corkscrew, so I offered my considerable skills (hehehe) and popped the corks for her. Sadly, she didn’t really know anything about the wines, so I just tasted through and left quickly.
2008 Cederberg Bukettraube-This was a new grape for me…normally I’d add it to my Century Club application, but Matt and I are trying to finish our applications together, so we’re only counting grapes we both tried. Lemon, citrus, grapefruit, light, crisp, tastes like Sauvignon Blanc.
2008 Springfield Estate Sauvignon Blanc-Peppers, grapefruit, lemon, crisp, good acidity.
2003 Springfield Estate Wild West Chardonnay-Pear, apple, tropical, pineapple, crisp.
2008 Indaba Shiraz-Strawberry, plum, dry, not very fruity, reserved.
2007 Graham Beck Pinotage-Earthy, animal, strawberry, cherry.
2007 Koopmanskloof Pinotage-Dark chocolate, pepper, rose, meat, cedar, smoke. Really liked this one.
2007 Koopmanskloof Shiraz- Very woody, fruity, raisins, port like, finish falls off.
An interesting selection. I would have liked to see more Sauvignon Blancs as I have tried some really nicely done ones from South Africa in the past.
Filed under: DC International Wine and Food Festival, South Africa, Wine |
Wannabe Wino Wine Blog 
Chenin Blanc is the grape you really need to try from SA, that’s becoming their flagship varietal.
I love your blog 🙂
Too bad some of the great South African wines were not shown. The Indaba line ( which runs about 7 or 8 bucks or so) is a great recession buster as well as Excelsior. When you get into the higher end Rustenberg, Kanonkop, De Toren, and if you can ever get your hands on it – the De Morgenzon Chenin Blanc is other worldly. I can get my hands on these in NYC not sure where you are.
Cheers,
Sam
Thanks Winesleuth, I’ll to keep an eye out, never had it from there!
Thanks Saks!
Sam, I’ve had some of the Indaba before, but the others. I’ll have to see if anyone around here has them.
Well said Sonadora, I am a wine enthusiast myself and do not leave a chance for tasting great wine. Last week, my wife had arranged a wine tasting party and we wanted the perfect wine to serve. While checking out a couple of websites I came across Perdeberg Winery (http://www.perdeberg.co.za/). And bingo, the wine offered through their site was exactly what I wanted. Check out their website, I am sure you would love to try them.