We make a different style of Syrah than many in South Africa. We are looking for an elegant, polished presence. Full, but not over-the-top. We have been tweaking these vineyards over the past decade to emphasize these qualities, blending in small amounts of other varieties to add complexity.

Although this is a blend of three vineyard blocks, the primary vineyard is our “Block 1”, an incredibly stoney vineyard that most visitors can not believe will actually support plant life. This special vineyard gives an intense grippiness and serves as the backbone of the wine.

This is a blend from 3 different vineyard blocks at different elevations on our Jonkershoek Valley farm. The higher elevation vineyards have a finely textured decomposed granite soil and tend to produce a more elegant wine with softer tannins, while the lower vineyard is very rocky and gives a denser, fruitier, more tannic wine. The grapes for this wine were hand-harvested in late-February and crushed into small open fermentation vats. Natural yeast fermentation. About 10% of the wine was whole-bunch fermented with its stems. Fermented in small open top tanks with natural fermentation. We also co-fermented small lots with Roussanne and Viognier. The Roussanne adds a very finely textured tannin and the Viognier elegant floral notes. Regular, vigorous punchdowns were given every 4 hours for the first half of fermentation, then every 8 hours thereafter. At dryness (average 7-10 days), it was racked directly to barrel for malo-lactic fermentation and subsequent barrel maturation. A mix of coopers was used, all French oak, all 300-litre, mostly 2nd, 3rd and 4th-fill (about 10% new). After 20 months barrel maturation, the wine was bottled with no fining and filtration.