Terroir winners: Front from left are Adam Mason (Klein Constantia), De Wet Lategan (Bergsig), Christo Pienaar (Nuy), David Nieuwoudt (Ghost Corner) and Jacques Bruwer (Bon Courage). Middle from left are Marinus Bredell (Fort Simon), Conrad Vlok (Strandveld), Bartho Eksteen (Hermanuspietersfontein), Charles Hopkins (De Grendel), Susan Perold (SoetKaroo) and André du Toit (Springfontein). Behind from left are DP Burger (Glenwood), Johnnie Calitz (Anura), Albertus van Rensburg (Avondrood), William Wilkinson (Wildekrans) and Brett Rightford (Diemersfontein).

WINE COMPETITIONS being the lottery that they are, should at least offer spirited events when it comes to announcing the results after the deliberations of the esteemed judges. After a decade and some in the wine industry, I find most of the awards functions for the various SA wine competitions about as much fun as a budget speech for a Germanic country. In most instances, ceremony masters and organisers of said competitions – not to mention the precious sponsors – go to pontificating lengths to make the event long-winded, boring and spiritless. Exactly what the wine industry should not be about.
My first sojourn to the SA Terroir Wine Awards this year promptly set about trashing my selfish preconceptions. It was one of the most fun-filled events on the wine calendar ever since the black-tie gala where a well-known female winemaker dipped a set of just-removed underwear into one of the wine glasses on our table.
The Terroir Awards makes no bones about being there for the most important part of the units that make up wine competitions, namely the winemaker.
For each award, a winemaker got onto the stage for an ad-lib speech. This varied from the tongue-in-cheek humour of Charles Hopkins to the Herman Charles Bosman-like delivery by Susan  Perold from SoetKaroo.
Master of Ceremonies Johan Rademan, he of SABC radio fame, also did a sterling job to get the humour and genuine feel of the event going.
Terroir Awards is the hottest wine competition on town. And congratulations on Marius Labuschagne for the idea and the backbone in putting it all together.
I will thus use his press release in full!
Press Release – SA Terroir Awards 2009
After a record 205 entries for the fourth annual SA Terroir Wine Awards, three wineries this year made their mark by entering two national winners, namely Bon Courage Estate near Robertson, Springfontein Estate near Stanford and Strandveld Vineyards near Elim.
Bon Courage delivered the Top Cabernet Sauvignon with the Bon Courage Inkara Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 and Top Colombar with the Bon Courage Andre’s Fame 2009, both are estate wines.  Springfontein’s two national winners are also estate wines, the Springfontein Jonathan’s Ridge Pinotage 2007 for the Top Pinotage and Springfontein Jil’s Dune Chenin Blanc 2008 for the Top Chenin Blanc. It is the second year consecutively that Springfontein entered the Top Chenin Blanc. Strandveld Vineyards’ national winners are Strandveld Vineyards Sauvignon Blanc 2008 for the Top Sauvignon Blanc and First Sighting Shiraz 2007 for the Top Shiraz. Both are certified as Wine of Origin from the Elim ward.
The bordering wine growing areas from Hermanus to Elim, namely Walker Bay and Cape Agulhas, this year delivered seven of the twenty National Certificate winners, those from Springfontein and Strandveld, as well as the Hermanuspietersfontein Swartskaap 2007 for the Top Cabernet Franc (second year consecutively), David Nieuwoudt Ghost Corner Semillon 2008 for the Top Semillon (second year consecutively) and Wildekrans MCC 2007 for the Top Sparkling wine.
This year was the first time a Rosé wine received a National Certificate at the annual SA Terroir Wine Awards and it is a Pinotage Rosé from the Goudini ward in the Breedekloof, the Avondrood Blush Pinotage Rosé 2009.
Another first National Certificate winner was for a red Muscat d’Alexandrie dessert wine from Prins Albert in the Klein Karoo, the SoetKaroo Red Muscat d’Alexandrie 2008.
“There are only two red Muscat d’Alexandrie (Hanepoot) wines in South Africa and the majority of the judges insisted that this wine must be awarded for its uniqueness and high quality. The National Certificate is for the red Muscat d’Alexandrie cultivar and not for the top dessert wine,” says Marius Labuschagne, project leader of SA Terroir Wine Awards.
The other National Certificate winners are Diemersfontein Thokozani 2008 (Wellington ward) for the Top Red Blend, De Grendel Winifred 2008 (Durbanville ward) for the Top White Blend, Signatures of Doolhof Malbec 2007 (Wellington ward) for the Top Malbec, Fort Simon Platinum Collection 2008 (estate wine, Bottelary) for the Top Viognier, Glenwood Chardonnay Vignerons Selection 2008 (Franschhoek ward) for the Top Chardonnay, Anura Petit Verdot Limited Release 2007 (Simonsberg-Paarl ward) for the Top Petit Verdot, Klein Constantia Vin de Constance 2005 (estate wine, Constantia) for the Top Natural Sweet Wine, Bergsig Cape LBV 200 (estate wine, Breedekloof) for the Top Port and both Nuy White Muscadel 2004 and Nuy Red  Muscadel 2003 (Nuy ward) for the Top Muscadel. Nuy last year also entered the Top Muscadel.
The three wines which received the highest score and which were rated highest of all the wines entered are the Klein Constantia Vin de Constance 2005, Springfontein Jil’s Dune Chenin Blanc 2008 and Diemersfontein Thokozani 2008.
SA Terroir Wine Awards, with the cooperation of the Wine and Spirit Board, strictly apply the rule that only wines certified as single vineyard, estate or from a specific ward can participate.
Most entries were Shiraz (30), followed by Sauvignon Blanc (25), Red Blends (22), Chardonnay (17), Pinotage (14) and Cabernet Sauvignon (14). The organisers were quite surprised with the number of natural sweet wines that were entered, ten in total, of which most were Noble Late Harvest wines.
The judges were Charl Theron, Dave Hughes, David Biggs, Elsa Carstens and Clive Torr.
Johan Henn, CEO of Novare Actuaries and Consultants, the sponsor of SA Terroir Wine Awards, said: “This sponsorship fits in well with our business philosophy, which is to look for unique opportunities that contribute to the development of the South African investment environment and economy. Novare’s vision of entrepreneurial spirit, continuous innovation and creativity is reflected in the SA Terroir Wine Awards that recognise wine-making excellence.”
Novare is owned by the Mvelaphanda Group Limited (50.1%) and currently manages assets of over R70 billion. The group consists of Novare Actuaries & Consultants, Novare Investments, Novare Botswana, Novare Actuaries Africa and Novare Equity Partners.
The results were monitored and verified by Pierre Groenewald, Chartered Accountant from Novare.

South Africa’s Wine Magazine has come in for a bit of a pasting of late, and the mag’s current obsession with babies due to its fertile editorial staff, will no doubt lead to a bit more. Top of the hit-list remains, however, the Cellar Door Shoot Out Section presided over by Jeanri-Tine van Zyl, a column that has seen grown, mature men in the wine business converted into sulking heaps by the in-your-face way Jeanri reports on her visits to certain wineries in the Cape.
Tim James, Cape Wine Master and head of South Africa’s leading amateur wine blog collection www.grape.co.za leads the pack of unneutered hounds baying for Jeanri-Tine’s blood. The audacity of witnessing a 25 year-old daring to tell it like it is and refusing to partake in the vainglorious, self-centred wine-speak of the wine philosophers is too much for James and many others who feel done in by the job Jeanri-Tine’s pen does in pointing to the weaknesses evident in wine-tasting venues.
So frustrated is this man, that he even backs up his criticism of her by hitting out at her name – Jeanri-Tine. This he does not like, and finds silly.
Tim, for Claret’s sake, what is the woman supposed to do about her name?
Oscar Foulkes, one of the finest wine writers around, is the latest example of a man hurt by this woman’s none-too flattering report of the winery where he works out of in the August issue of Wine. Read his rather self-pitying reply to Jeanri-Tine’s take on Cloof.
Having been in the business of reviewing for close on 20 years, I think those objecting to Jeanri-Tine’s articles are a bunch of whingers who need a bit more experience in the dog-eat-dog world of tourism. Actors, artists, writers and musicians, who are exposed to a horde of critics each time they are involved in a new play, film, exhibition or novel, will surely laugh at the sulky reactions of those who are not able to take any form of criticism on the chin.
I mean, what is the big deal?
A winery has a tasting centre. It has taken a decision to open said tasting centre for visitations from the public. For this, visitors are encouraged – through advertisements, Platter guide notes, websites and newsletters – to embark on a journey to the tasting centre.
In this relationship between winery and patron, a certain degree of expectation is created. The winery expects the visitor to invest in time and travel to call upon the winery. In turn, the visitor has the right to expect a certain experience and level of service from the winery.
What is it about this that James and his anti-Van Zyl brigade do not understand?
Okay, let’s forget about them for a moment and get back to the real world of normal, paying customers prepared to invest in having that enlightening and original experience promised by the winery.
If there is a chance that the experience may not live up to expectation, we have the right to be aware of this. The right to know.
And if not the media, on whom else can we trust for the right to know?
So Jeanri-Tine does not beat about the bush. She has a sharp pen and calls a spade a shovel. But that is exactly what the public expect from the media, in case anybody has forgotten.
The real reason so many people are pissed off is because Wine Magazine is, to my mind, the first local publication to embark on this concept of delivering critique on wineries. For the record, years back I was asked to write a similar series for a journalism unit – as long as nothing negative is reported “otherwise we’ll lose advertisers”. (I told them to fuck off phenolically.)
Hopefully Jeanri-Tine’s writings will lead to a bit of navel gazing. Perhaps there are certain aspects of wine tourism that are not as great as we think they are. Perhaps we yet have certain things to learn. Maybe there is room for improvement.
Maybe we don’t realise how important this criticism is, once we stop being so damn over-sensitive.
- Editor

The woman was tall, blond and had just spent four years in Italy. But I had to turn her down. No, absolutely, not. Stop begging. Get up off your knees! I am not accepting a freebie to lunch at Delaire.
So after chasing off the Delaire PR and ensuring my plastic was loaded, I waltzed into the restaurant at Delaire, which is the wine estate on the top of the Helshoogte Pass with a view down the valley that would turn Julie Andrews into Lady GaGa. The restaurant makes full use of this view of the majestic valley between the Simonsberg and Drakenstein Mountains, which are very lovely when the sun shines in winter, as everything is very green, except for the vines, which are still pretty.
In any event, the restaurant is a cavernous open space with just the right amount of chic to draw you in and the right amount of class to keep the riff-raff out. Your tables are set along snake-like and continuous leather couches the colour of butternut. A huge red William Kentridge painting looks down on you, without offending anyone. Sharply dressed staff lead you to tables of linen and silver, and big wine glasses.
It’s not quite the sort of place where you’d scratch your crotch or break wind as you saunter across the room, yet you feel comfortable in a pampered sort of way.
Jeremy Clarkson, my guest, loved the fact that super Babe Michelle McLean was sitting at one of the tables picking at something green, low-calorie and unappetising. This meant that all eyes were fixed on her, some of which were expectantly waiting for one of her mammaries to jump out of that low-cut dress. With all the attention on Shellie, thus, Clarkson didn’t stand a chance of being noticed, although he says he does not wish to be. (Like hell.)
In any event, we were starving, a common physical situation to be in for those suffering blinding hangovers. And when we spotted the items on the menu, joy was in the air.
For here, at Delaire, was food! Not a poncy, limp-wristed tower of nouvellish hell in sight. No jus of any sort. No blanches. The only foam was on Clarkson’s chin as he whispered the names of the dishes. “Sirloin steak”…”Rump steak”…”Fish and Chips”….”Baby Chicken”….yes, real food.
To get things going we kicked off with some Delaire Sauvignon Blanc 2008, which was zingy and cool, the brisk acids livening up our stomachs for the meal to come. A pleasant lady with glasses brought us the bread basket, which we almost emptied in one flour swoop. (Get it!)
The bread replenished our vast pits of hangover hunger, which meant we could leap into 12 oysters each. The other appetizers included buffalo mozzarella and tomato salad, Caesar salad, tuna tartar and scallops and – obviously for the weirdos – beetroot carpaccio.
The oysters were presented on the half-shell, perching on a platter of rock salt to ensure the shells don’t wobble all over the place. And they molluscs were absolutely terrific. So fresh were they, that you could actually hear them curse your grandmother’s pink bits each time you hit them with a searing drop of fresh lemon juice.
Sweet, clear, cool. Out of this world.
For the main course, Clarkson had fish and chips, while I decided on the sirloin. No sauce, just fries.
Okay, so this was not your regular steak-house or fish shop fare. The fish, cob, to be exact, was perfectly cooked in a light, puffy tempura-style batter. The chips were perfectly cut and had been freshly fried – unlike those horrid pre-cooked slivers so many establishments prefer these days due to cost-cutting and sheer laziness.
My steak was not going to drop Bakkies Botha – it was smallish, but tasty and cooked to perfection. Like everything, it tasted fresh, simple and moerishly moreish.
Other main menu items included a salmon dish, a decadent crayfish lasagne, lamb, short rib and a loin of venison.
After the impressive Sauvignon Blanc, I ventured towards Chardonnay territory, while Clarkson did the Delaire Red.
The Chardonnay was okay in the sort of way that Adi Jacobs is an okay rugby player – not going anywhere. I found the wine dying on the mid palate and ending in watery nowhere-ness. The Red, a Bordeaux blend with a dollop of Shiraz, was also not going to get anyone’s motor racing, so we changed gear and had a bottle of Le Riche Cabernet Sauvignon. What a wine – by this stage Shellie could have been moonwalking starkers on the tables, it would not have taken our attention from the wine.
No dessert, so we opted for coffees and some Vin de Constance, and – if I remember correctly – the bill came to just over a Grand.
Now, about that freebie…..

E. Louw Joubert

In the only South African wine competition committed to the furthering of women’s rights, six dynamic winemakers have been selected to the final round of this year’s Landbouweekblad Woman Winemaker of the Year Award. South Africa’s only competition for woman winemakers, now in it’s sixth year, is sponsored by leading South African agricultural magazine, Landbouweekblad, a publication that knows how important it is to have a woman around the farm.
This year’s competition saw 64 entries from 28 winemakers across the country. According to the effervescent Lorraine Immelman-Steyn, organiser of this competition and also a woman, the growing entries shows that women are now firmly settled into and impressing in the wine industry.
“Not only in South Africa, but also in other parts of the wine world there are an increasing number of women entering the wine industry,” she said. “Across the world there is a growing awareness of woman winemakers, even through similar international competitions. Just think about the National Woman’s Wine Competition, as well as the Women Winemakers Challenge.”
This year’s finalists include well-known names, as well as newcomers. Danelle van Rensburg of Van Loveren in Robertson are in the final round with a 2009 Colombar, Ntsiki Biyela of Stellekaya in Stellenbosch are now part of the top six with her 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon and Carmen Stevens of Amani, also in Stellenbosch, went through with her 2008 Amani Kamili Chardonnay/Viognier blend.
The other three finalists are Corlea Fourie of Bosman Family Vineyards in Wellington with her 2008 Chenin Blanc, Corrien Geleijnse of Swartland Wine Cellar in Malmesbury with her 2008 Shiraz and last, but not least is Nomonde Kubheka of KWV in Paarl with her 2007 red blend named Triptych.
The winner will be announced on July 30 at a gala ceremony at the Lord Charles Hotel in Somerset-West.
According to Marilyn Cooper, Managing Director of the Cape Wine Academy and president of the judging panel, this year’s competition is known for diverse and innovative entries. “For the first time ever a port was entered into the competition, as well as interesting single variety wines such as Malbec. The panel was surprised with a selection of different and exciting wines,” she said.
The Landbouweekblad Woman Winemaker of the Year must, however, do more than only creating exceptional wines. The winner is judged according to her overall personality, her view of the wine industry and her career goals. (Breast size plays no role whatsoever, it has been learned.) After the top wines are selected through a blind tasting, a choice panel of judges interviewed the six finalists.
Apart from Cooper, the panel include Erika Obermeyer, last year’s winner and winemaker at Graham Beck Wines; Jo-Anne Mettler, wine judge and PRO at L’Ormarins; Cathy Marston, wine writer from the UK and wine consultant Nicolette Waterford.
According to Landbouweekblad, the main sponsor of this event, interest is growing in this competition where an ambassador to the wine industry for the next year is chosen. It now is a highlight on the South African wine calendar.
“The number of entries is growing each year and the competition sees entries from winemakers from big, well-established cellars, as well as smaller cellars from upcoming wine regions,” says Immelman-Steyn. “I am delighted about how this competition has evolved, especially because this competition shows that women across cultural borders are choosing winemaking as a career. The number of entries shows that the title of Woman Winemaker of the Year is becoming increasingly important to our woman winemakers. In the current economic climate, I feel any positive publicity where the focus is on wine, is of great advantage when we want to make wine the chosen lifestyle product of the whole of our nation.
Each finalist will receive a pamper pack from Lanzerac Wellness Centre and Spa, as well as a gift pack from Distinctive Brands’ with Spiegelau crystal ware. A new sponsor came to the party this year and the winning label, as well as the finalists’ labels will be sponsored by Collotype, the internationally recognised label printing company.
This years winner will also receive a cash prize of R20 000.

Riaan Smit, journalist, retailer, property developer and now Elsenburg student gives his take on the Social Media phenomenon.

I am skeptical, especially when something is presented as the Next Big Thing. But I have to admit that often skepticism can be an excuse for ignorance.

Social Media is increasingly being touted as the NBT in wine marketing and, for a while, I found it hard to get excited, because I could not get a handle on what Social Media is about.
Then the wineblog, enobytes, ran an article that started as follows:

“The social media paradigm is transforming our media landscape to an unrecognizable form many are not willing to accept. Are you one of them? Then listen up because this paradigm shift is happening whether you like it or not and I have a few tips to help you transition to the new media world.

“It’s a direction that will affect everyone in the wine industry, from wine writers to wineries, magazines, newspapers and marketing folks. If you don’t jump on the social media bandwagon you might just be left in the dark. If you don’t believe me, then listen to Clay Shirky, a prescient voice on the effects of the Internet.”

The link to a 15 minute video switched the light bulbs on for me and completely shifted my paradigm of what media is today.

Shirky argues that there have only been four periods over the last five hundred years where media has changed enough to qualify for the label “Revolution” – printing and press; telegraph and telephone; recorded media; radio and television.
We are living in the fifth revolution with social media.

He explains that the first four are all media distributing messages to the masses along a one-way channel. There is no immediate talk-back. It may facilitate discussion among individuals, but they cannot get more information from the original source of the message.

Today, former media consumers are now the media producers, and the ability for consumers to communicate among themselves is the new media landscape. In marketing terms it means messages about your product can be produced by anyone and distributed at the press of a button. The beauty is that Social Media allows the producer of a product to initiate a conversation about a product/brand and sustain this conversation once it has started and proliferated.
Shirky argues that applications such as Facebook and Twitter allows almost limitless interactions between individuals and the source(s) of (media) messages. This breaks the talk-down mold of media and is essentially changing the way societies work.

Says enobytes: “I grew up on magazines and I have no shame admitting I still subscribe to publications like the Winespectator and Food & Wine. However, as much as I feel some regret for abandoning the old model, we need to evolve and move on because many consumers no longer identify with print. Why? The social media landscape delivers content faster and more effectively and the communication between the masses is recreating the user experience. It’s going beyond the one-to-one or one-to-many communication patterns via telephone, radio and TV and evolving to a many-to-many pattern, which instills sharing and innovation.”

Put very simply: If you think your pretty print advertisement depicting your prized Syrah grown bio-dynamically (your supposed competitive advantage – but who is explaining it to 95% of your consumers who does not know what the hell bio-whatever is), or running a website that is just another website, or putting a cleavage bimbo behind your tasting counter with zilch ability to have an intelligent discussion about your wines, your cellar, or terroir, if you think this is the best way of spending your marketing Rands, think again.

With the current investigation into exorbitant food-prices, I could not ignore the chance of highlighting gross exploitation in the booze industry.
The latest example has to do with a Port I was seeking as a birthday gift for a friend on the eve of his 60th.
The Wine Village, a well-known wine shop at the foot of the Hemel-en-Aarde Valley had a bottle of KWV 1949 Port. The price? R1 500. A bit steep I thought, but then again, the stuff is 60 years old.
Just before I drove through to get it, I ventured into the KWV Wine Emporium for a squizz and to check out whether its wines were improving. Lo and behold, there were a few bottles of KWV 1949 – at R480 a bottle.
Look, I know this is not the same as ripping off consumers scratching together for enough loose change to buy bread. But if the Wine Village is tripling prices on one item, who knows what is happening with its pricing of other products?
Aluta Continua!

In a South African wine journalism exclusive, WineGoggle talks to Bruno, style expert, movie star and wine lover

WineGoggle: Are you a wine-lover?

Brüno: An über wine-lover. I mean, I am a gay Austrian so I have to like and appreciate wine. Only the straight Austrian’s believe that the traditional scheisse we make, such as Grüner Veltliner, can be classed as good wine.

WineGoggle: So where did you learn about wine?

Brüno: Where everyone should – the school of life. I escaped my Grüne Veltliner-loving, goat-humping fellow Austrians by being exposed to the fashion ramps and studios of Paris, Milan and New York. Besides Milan, these cities have terrific wine cultures.

WineGoggle: What was the problem with Italy? I thought they have an active wine culture?

Brüno: A nation with so many straight people, such as Italy, cannot have an active wine culture.

WineGoggle: What was your first memorable wine experience?

Brüno: Two fantastic, wonderful moments in my life. The first was when my friend Maximillian showed my his schwanzenstook after soccer practice in junior school. The second was when I had my first sip of Salon Champagne during Paris Fashion Week. Waking up in that hotel-room in the Marais District, the pop of the cork and some strange man topping a crystal glass with champagne…..even though my stinker was very painful, the champagne was wonderful.

WineGoggle: You seem to  a have thing for Champagne. In your new movie you and your lover employ a somewhat original way of pouring Champagne into flutes?

Brüno (laughs): You obviously refer to the bottle of Champagne up-ended in his asenflogen and then poured the other way around. And you believe this, you domkopffen? Get a life, this is a movie. In real life we have the Champagne glass in the asenflogen. What else? By the way, what I love about Austria wine is our Riedl glasses, the gayest wine glasses in the world.

WineGoggle: What is the role of wine in your life, besides celebrating or committing strange acts with bottles of Champagne?

Brüno: If you have style – like me – you gotta know what’s happening in the wine world. The fashion world, it is vacuous, egocentric, greedy and very gay. Just like the wine world.

WineGoggle: So, what wines are fashionable. If we were at a restaurant instead of talking on the telephone, and I asked you to handle the wine-list, what should we be drinking?

Brüno: Well, we’re probably going to be doing sushi because I last had carbs the day before Maximillian showed me his schwanzenstook. So we’d have sashimi and kick-off with a Sancerre or a Chablis to stimulate the appetite and to get the stomach juices flowing. (This also makes it easier to throw-up those calories afterwards.) Then I’d say we switch to a Burgundy from south of Beaune, it’s much fruitier. Or Pinot Noir from Oregon. And if you wanna get heavier, a Napa Cabernet Sauvignon or Australian Shiraz would be the way to go.

WineGoggle: No South African wines?

Brüno: Yeah, I heard you guys are making some wine, but if the wine is like your fashion, you’re really going to have to convince me. I mean, all those black guys with oversized glasses blowing into those plastic pipes, that’s a real turn on. But what I’ve seen in your magazines and websites and stuff, well, it’s pretty lame. I don’t wanna be nasty, but it’s pretty lame – like Lebanon meets New Jersey. So if wine follows fashion, as it should, I’m not putting my kegelsakken on a block that the wine is going to be any good.

WineGoggle: But I sent your publicists some articles on wine, and if I remember, a bottle of Pinotage, South Africa’s national grape?

Brüno: Your PR is not bad, but the wine situation is all confusing. Take Pinotage – I drank it with some guys in a steam-bath in San Francisco last week – and, man, what a gay wine! It is wünderbaar and we spöngent all over each other after one glass. Fantastic stuff, the gayest of gay wines I’ve had – and that’s saying a lot as I recently went to a tasting of Right Bank Bordeaux. Hah! Right Bank – they are as skew as a picnic basket.
But back to you South Africans, despite Pinotage obviously being a gay wine, made by asenklompers, the rest of the industry seems to be so like, uncoolly straight? Not one gay winemaker? I read some stuff, like WineLand Magazine and some website called grape and it is all so manlichfunken. Too butchen for me, Cool Cat. I mean, I see the South African wine industry has a campaign called variety-is-in-our-nature. It sounds gay, but is not gay enough.

WineGoggle: So, we shouldn’t be expecting a visit from Brüno?

Brüno: Look, I don’t believe in saying never. And if you’ve seen the video-clips on my acts with fire-hoses and fire-extinguishers you’ll know what I mean. But South Africa’s got to pull down its kükkenhosen and show me what it’s got. Send me another couple of cases of Pinotage, and I might change my mind.

Ernest Hemingay had gout - "grace under pressure."

Last week I visited the beautiful Cape town of Montagu, a place not know for abstinence. With hordes of kids running around the streets, there is not a lot of celibacy going on. This is obvious.
 And when it comes to the pleasure of imbibing good wine, they don’t hold back either. My host was Alwyn Liebenberg, the livewire cellarmaster at Montagu’s Uitvlucht winery as well as being a legendary deep-sea fisherman. I was in town to discuss a business proposition with Alwyn concerning some classic Port, and ended-up staying for dinner with him, his charming wive Beulah and their whizzkid daughter, Olivia.
After a bottle of Champagne, we had a delicious fillet poached in red wine accompanied by two bottles of red wine, of which one was Priorat. Then followed a cheeseboard in tandem with a bottle of Malmsey Madeira (Blandy’s) and one bottle of the secret Port we were there to discuss. As Alwyn said the following morning clearing the bottles: “Thank heavens it was only a week night, otherwise we might really have got stuck in.”
Business done, I headed back to Cape Town and – sure as hell – my gout started tightening its iron grip on my heel.
Now, for those who have not experienced gout, think of a red-hot steel skewer being inserted slowly into an ankle, toe or heel joint by the person you love who is also emptying a bottle of Cheval Blanc 1962 into a kitchen sink in front of you and listening to the minutes of a KWV board-meeting. It is that painful.
By the time I got to Cape Town I could hardly exert pressure on the accelerator the pain was so intense. I stopped at a pharmacy, hobbled over to the counter and got a packet of Cataflan pills.
Relief was slow in coming, but it came.
Talking to Alwyn later that evening, I mentioned the gout and told him that the Madeira and Port had obviously taken up sides with my gout to descend the lances of pain on me. Fortified wines are traditionally known gout-causers.
Being a Port lover of the knowledgeable kind, he defended his beloved elixir like a father defending the reputation of a favourite child. “What about the cheese you had? And the meat?” he asked. “Did you think about that?”
Upon further research, I discovered that Alwyn was, indeed, correct. And while those partaking in the odd bit of liquid refreshment do succumb to the dreaded “G”, beer is known to be the major contributor. More so than wine – fortified or not.
I thus quickly did some reminiscing. Port on Tuesday. But five pints of lager on the Monday before.
No wonder those guys in the Castle advertisements keep shrieking all the time.
Of course, a fact about gout that could have caused South African Breweries much of a headache is the fact that people of African origin are far less likely to suffer from gout than whiteys. And if you are of English origin, you are five times more likely to go down from this painful affliction.
It could not happen to a nicer bunch.

E Louw Joubert

The fact that American consumers, who constitute the world’s second largest wine market, prefer cork was affirmed by a recent high-profile development in the wine industry.
Recently it was announced that a wine from Marlborough, New Zealand, had replaced California’s iconic Kendall Jackson as the Number One selling brand of Sauvignon Blanc in the USA.
According to British wine publication Decanter, Nobilo Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc has become the first New Zealand wine to top varietal sales, taking over from Kendall Jackson.
Says Joe Stanton, chief executive of Constallation NZ: “When we launched the brand we aspired to be the number one Sauvignon Blanc brand in the USA, and to do that we had to focus on targeting what we saw as the ‘traditional’ US wine consumer.”
To do this, Stanton said the company packaged the brand specifically for the American consumer by sealing the brand under cork, a move that meant going against the dominant screw-cap trend in New Zealand.
As they say, the proof of the pudding……This just goes to show that cork’s reputation as the closure of choice in the quality market is beyond refute.