Saronsberg’s
winemaker Dewaldt Heyns welcomes us with their crisp and delightful MCC Brut
2009, a blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir
This is what
we do for a living... well, some of us
The Brut MCC,
showing some of the prestigious awards it has received.
We begin the
tasting and the tweeting ..
... and the
conversation, while the Restaurant Manager, Martin Drotsky, and PRO Nicolette Waterford
pour the wines
Dewaldt is
extremely knowledgeable about his wines and his terroir and his soils and
explained what they are trying to achieve in a very interesting way.
The line up of
wines we tasted
Winemaker
Dewaldt Heyns with Mariette and Nick van Huysteen, the owners of Saronsberg
We then moved
into the Signal restaurant for lunch
One of the
wines we especially loved was the Shiraz rosé, which tastes just like a ripe
red plum with savoury notes. This pairing of the ripe tomato, baby beets and
strawberry sorbet completely echoed that wine and was a brilliant pairing.
Tomato is notoriously hard to pair with wine, this is a real find AND is only
R45 a bottle on the farm. This dish was originally going to be the starter for the
vegetarians among us, but was so successful that they served it to everyone, together
with the Smoked salmon trout and prawn starter. That went superbly with the Viognier
which is elegant and restrained and not overfull or over wooded.
The main course
of tender Chalmar sirloin in a good rich jus and roasted figs went so well with
the beautifully made savoury Grenache 2011. The other good wine paired with
this course was the Full Circle 2011 which is a Michelangelo Platinum award
winning Rhône blend of Shiraz, Grenache, Mourvedre and a soupçon of Viognier
and is made to go with meat dishes like this.
Dessert was a poem
of textures and flavours. The crisp cream filled choux bun with a crunchy
coating was stuffed full with white chocolate cheesecake and accompanied by a
nicely balanced slightly sour peach and vanilla paste with a dollop of burnt honey
ice cream. Served with the epic 2006Six Point Three straw wines it echoed all
those flavours and the wine added more of the same flavours and sweetness the
each mouthful. The exciting Brut 2010 was a good counterpoint to the dish,
taking away any cloying richness with its crisp beady full palate.
All in all
it was a pretty damned fine tasting and meal with some great wines. Thank you
Dewaldt, Saronsberg and Cape Grace chefs.
© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014
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