Best Wines of the New World: Hot & Cold

February 22nd, 2010 | Posted by Hennie

I’m off to South Africa and somehow, instead of being a purely private trip, it has become a rush from south to north with tastings and talks in between. All organised by good friends and wine lovers  Cobie and Bjorn of CVO Marketing. Be that as it may and despite all my grunts to the opposite effect, I am actually looking forward to it!

They’ve organised a “taste-off” with the Wine Clubs South Africa with our Sandihurst wines and the South African equivalent varietals. I’m waiting to get the list of the “competition” but as it stands at this point in time, our cool climate wines I’ve decided to use are our Central Otago Pinot Noir 2007, the 2006 Canterbury Riesling and the 2008 Waipara Pinot Gris. All good fun and there will be a lot of banter going around I’m sure, but besides all of that, I’m really keen on seeing how the palates react to our cool climate wines.

From personal experience, and also from comments made by visitors to the Cellar Door who come from warmer climate regions, it can be quite a revelation as regards expectations of a particular varietal. Probably the most immediate that comes to mind is the ‘warm climate palate’ and its first introduction to a cool climate Pinot Noir. When I left South Africa, Pinot Noir was not a varietal with a particularly high profile. Clearly this has changed and is changing and I’ll be visiting and talking to some winemakers to listen and learn where I can.

I’ll be letting you know the outcome and the comments – it is going to be interesting! Any suggestions on a particular SA wine (or wines) I just have to try whilst there – I’ll be there for 10 days…