|
Our Vintage 2004 produced a particulary elegant
and well-balanced wine, and only a very light egg white fining (from happy
free-range hens notabene!) was needed, before the wine was bottled on the 15th
of April 2005.
After a further year of bottle maturation in our own new climate-controlled
premises, it was released in March 2006. The wine surprises with its supple texture and elegant body, ripe and
soft, with smooth though at this stage naturally still perceptible tannins, and a lovely balance and length.
It offers already now great drinking
pleasure, but will continue to grow over the next 5-7 years.
As our previous vintages, this wine is an
excellent companion to fine food such as roast meat or a cheese platter. Thanks
to its rather elegant structur, it will never overpower the food, but offers
enough body and olfactory complexity to complement the dishes synergistically.
11600 bottles have been produced
Tasting notes:
Stephen Tanzer, 89 points in his The International Wine Cellar (April 2007)
"Deep red-ruby. Reticent aromas of black fruits and smoky, nutty oak.
Lusher on the palate than the young '05, offering almost Graves-like flavors of
blackberry, blueberry, minerals and tobacco. Broader and darker than the '05 but
with a bit less lift. Finishes dense and rich, with notes of leather and earth"
www.wineaccess.com/expert/tanzer
online wine magazin GRAPE (April 2006)
:
"The clear, dark ruby brilliance pinpoints the wine’s youth, as does
its still unrevealing flavours. Aromas hint of red and blackcurrant, extra dark
Belgian (Swiss?) chocolate and traces of tobacco and cedar. Although relatively
full bodied – at 14%, the alcohol level is the highest yet – the wine has a
good acid backbone and beautifully elegant mouthfeel. With a few years’ aging
this merlot should prove even more satisfying. Now with their own cellar and
well-tended, older vines, future vintages promise to rate even higher"
(www.grape.co.za)
Ratings:
-
89 points from American wine critic Stephen Tanzer (April 2007)
- Press
Prize at the Emozioni del Mondo 2006 in Bergamo / Italy for best SA Merlot
- Bronce medal at the London International Wine and Spirit
Competition IWSC 2006
- Bronce medal at the VERITAS Awards South Africa 2006
- 16/20
points by the online wine magazin GRAPE (13.4.2006)
- Bronze medal @ Korea Wine Challenge 2006
- ****4/5 stars by JOHN PLATTER 2006
Analysis:
Alc 14.0%Vol, TA 5.6 g/L, pH 3.6, RS 2.6 g/L, VA 0.52 g/l, TSO2 66
mg/l, free SO2 35 mg/L
Vintage report:
April
2005
After a very gentle and conservative
fining with fresh egg white (from our "happy" hens!), our Merlot 2004
was filtered and bottled on the 15th of April 2005.
At present, the wine surprises with its supple texture and elegant body, ripe and
soft though with still clearly perceptible tannins, and a lovely balance and length.
Now, it is allowed a year of bottle aging for final integration, before it will
be released begin of next year.
December
2004
Up to now, the wine was racked already twice, a process in which the wine is
cleared from lees and sediments by moving it carefully from one barrel to
another. The wine has beautifully developed since. Typically for this vintage is
its significantly lower acidity compared to other years, and the ripe and soft
tannins. Therefore, barrel samples are already unusually accessible and
captivate with its supple texture.
August 2004
The vintage 2004
develops well in the barrel. The second fermentation, the so-called malolactic
fermentation is accomplished and the wine racked for the first time. The
malolactic fermentation, in which the sharper malic acid is transformed by
bacteria into the milder lactic acid, is a difficult process, that has to be
monitored very carefully, in order to avoid bacterial spoilage of the wine.
March 8, 2004
After a dry ripening
season, rain arrived at the end of February, but luckily followed again by a
warm and dry period. Harvest took place on the 8th of March under ideal
conditions, yielding an optimally ripe crop at 24 Balling (Brix). The acidity
was significantly lower than in the previous years, in our opinion due to the
climatic conditions during the first half of the season, which led to a
significantly low overall vigour and correspondingly a significantly lower
number of actively growing shoot tips during the critical time (November/December).
Like in 2003, the fruit was hand-harvested and transported
without delay in small 15-kg-crates, in order to avoid any transport damage. In
the cellar, the fruit was again meticulously sorted on a sorting table prior to
the destemmer. After alcoholic fermentation in temperature-controlled, closed
stainless steel tanks with pumping over and an extended skin maceration of 10
days, the wine was pressed on the 22nd of March and went straight into small
French barriques (40% new) for malolactic fermentation. The result: a promising
wine of dark colour, high extract (36 g/L!) and an intense fruit.
By the way, we vinified our wine this year in the new cellar
of the University of Stellenbosch, Department of Oenology, which offered us
ideal working conditions (see pics!)
January 15, 2004
Veraison (change of colour) started in the second week of the new year, about
one week later than other years. This is the ideal time to reduce the crop to
the appropriate size, with the ultimate goal to improve the quality of the
remaining fruit. This year we reduced the entire crop to one bunch per fruiting
shoot, and in addition, we also removed late ripening parts of the bunches, such
as shoulders and tips, where necessary. Up to now, the weather was ideal, with
little wind and moderate temperatures, but lots of sunshine, It is conspicuous,
that vigour is generally very low. Should it stay like that, we expect an
excellent quality crop, to be harvested begin of March.
November 30, 2003
Flowering occurred during the first half of November and was very even. The
weather was up to now ideal for the vines, with lots of sun, very little wind
and just one rainy day. Accordingly, a big crop is developing and we will have
to start soon with the first flight of bunch thinning. The shoots are now
approximately 1 meter long and have reached the last supporting wire. However,
the soil is now quickly drying up due to the warm and unusually dry weather,
and growth is slowing down.
October 21, 2003:
Eventually, budding
was quite even, and the shoots have now a length of about 40 cm. Suckering (reducing
the shoots to the desired number) is completed, and the first pair of canopy
wires were set up yesterday to keep the shoots upright in there position. The
weather was beautiful during these last few days. This will promote flowering,
which is expected to set in within the next 7-10 days.
September 15, 2003
August brought the
usual rain, but to late for the wheat farmers and to little to compensate the
deficit. And eventually it also became cold, but unusually late for the season,
so that budding was hold back. The vines were pruned in the first week of
September. And now, in the third week of September, a few warm days promoted
budding, and the first shy leaves can be seen now and there, announcing the
opening of the new vintage.
July 2003
We are experiencing an unusually dry and warm winter. Beautiful to live here
- one beautiful day follows the other - but problematic for the agriculture. Up
to now, rainfall is 75% below the long-term average. The soil water reserves are
depleted and the dams empty, disastrous the situation for the wheat farmers in
the near Swartland on the West Coast. An other undesirable side effect of the
warm weather at the begin of winter is the fact, that the vines do not get
enough cold units, resulting most probably in uneven budding next spring. We
will try to counteract this by a very late pruning.
|
|
The cellar of the University of Stellenbosch, where we vinified our Merlot 2004
