Friends who came to supper last week brought with them two 1998 Sauvignons blanc, both from Stellenbosch. Most people think old South African white wines are not worth drinking, and we have found that that includes wines that are only a couple of years old! We do not hold with this belief, really enjoying wines with maturity and we have in the past had some notable and enjoyable older white wines. However it is quite a long time since we had any wine with this age, so we proceeded with caution and a little anticipation, not sure of what we might find.
Discussing the wines at tasting, we all thought that they must have been one of the first vintages from either producer. In fact, Villiera's first Sauvignon blanc was produced at the same time as the first Platter, 1980 and Thelema's was in 1988
We looked them both up in the 1999 Platter and it is interesting to compare our notes when we tasted the wines with the comments made when they were released.
The first wine we tasted was the 1998 Thelema
1999 Platter: Jam-packed with super-ripe gooseberry fruit, loads of flavour, seemingly indomitable alcohol 14.20%
Our note: Golden amber in colour and with golden fruit notes on the nose, there was richness and still a hint of that 14.20% alcohol. On the palate the golden fruit followed through with maturity and warmth from the alcohol. What it reminded us of was a good Spanish Sherry, an Oloroso in style for Lynne, who still found a little fruit, and a Manzanilla for John. We continued to drink this with dinner and the next day and it was very enjoyable and lasting.
Then we tasted the Villiera 1998 Bush Vine Sauvignon blanc
The corks were both in very good condition
1999 Platter: Herbaceous gooseberry-toned from unirrigated vineyards. Loire-like aroma, tropical asparagus top notes, accessible, not simple, persistent
Our note: Dark amber in colour, with honeycomb and apricot notes. It had a lovely mouthfeel, a buzz of alcohol and lots of depth of flavour with apricots and a hint of grape moskonfyt giving richness, but dry. There was also a sherried character and we found it very delicious. Good with food too. We loved the comment on the label, Winemaker Jeff Grier was correct: "Intended for extended maturation in the bottle". Indeed.
An essential tool for safe removal of older corks, which does not have the same propensity for putting crumbs of cork into your glass is the two prong cork puller. There are several brands; the one which seems to be most accessible in South Africa is made by VacuVin and can be found at TakeaLot, Makro and YuppieChef with quite a lot of variance in price. We have also seen one in Checkers
One final pertinent question. Why are we not drinking Sherry in South Africa? It is a really cool thing to drink as an apéritif and with food. Not the sticky oversweet stuff that masquerades as sherry, but the drier and more interesting styles. And we used to produced world class variations.
