We are going literary, yes we are. First up is a book review ofΓö¼├íWine & War: The French, The Nazis and The Battle for France╬ô├ç├ûs Greatest Treasure by Don and Petie Kladstrup. The reviewer is wine-lover, former financial industry expert and current enthusiastic historian William de Villiers. Look out for further intellectual discussions in future…….

1944. Paris stands on the threshold of liberation. Uniformed thugs burst into the apartment of the Baroness Philippe de Rothschild, and, before her terrified daughterΓÇÖs eyes, arrest and take her away. She will die in Ravensbr├╝ck in the spring of 1945.

Giorgio Dalla Cia. The Maestro.

A recent relentless travelling and business schedule in France had me pushed to the west, direction Bordeaux, throwing the flavours of Pauillac, Sauternes, duck hearts and Arcachon oysters at me with such feverish abandon that I did not even get around to drinking one red Burgundy during my stay. Okay, I did enquire at a wine market, once, but asking for Burgundy in the French west is pretty much like requesting a hymn-sheet at a Die Antwoord concert.

Chinese geisha using Western expressiveness.

Combine an EU recession with a crotch-achingly cold winter and the lack of tourists in Paris last week was not surprising. Never have I walked straight into the Musée d’Orsay, Invalides or one of the City of Light’s classy strip-clubs without standing in a slow-moving, grumbling queue. Yet this was indeed the case during a recent education trip –  me finding a city empty of foreigners or tourists. Except for the Chinese, that is.

 

Perlemoen, a.k.a abalone

It was a slimy little thing in a mother-of-pearl shell that went and got me all choked-up. Perlemoen we call it, also known as abalone. A creature found along the Cape Coast which has unfortunately become as scarce as a live suckling pig in Oporto due to perlemoenΓÇÖs popularity in the Far East.

Danie de Wet

Danie de Wet, proprietor and cellarmaster of De Wetshof Estate and a leading figure in the South African wine industry, wrote the following article for the ANC’s Progressive Leader magazine. An Afrikaans version appeared in Die Burger newspaper ofΓö¼├í 5 January.

When looking at the economic impact of the South African industry, one has to use a two-pronged approach. The reason being that unlike most agricultural products, one of wineΓÇÖs many unique features is that it cannot ΓÇô or should not ΓÇô be seen as another general, standardised commodity. Wine represents the cultural and geographical diversity of the various countries and the regions within those countries where it has been produced for centuries and millennia. And this enables wine to impact on the economy of a country in a number of ways.

Boere preparing to take on Bordeaux together with a representative from WIETA.

Heading off to Arcachon outside Bordeaux later this month, part of my visit will entail presenting a tasting of South African wines to some local journalists, rugby players and vignerons. As the first American on French soil during D-Day said: “There ain’t no free lunch.”

 Being averse to controversy, I avoided getting fully involved in a little twitter buzz flitting around a few weeks back. Di Procter, copy-editor and food-vino blogger, alerted followers to her detecting notes of Grenache in some local Pinot Noir she had been sampling.

I gave a courteous tweetish missive stating that this might well be the case. For the wine industry is by law allowed to add up to 15% of a grape variety other than the one stated on a single varietal wine. So while that bottle of wine might sport a dashing Cabernet Sauvignon or Riesling on the label, the content could very well contain 15% of Shiraz of Chardonnay respectively.

However, Di got me thinking about this issue – again. Surely this situation is counter to what the wine fraternity is attempting to communicate about our beloved elixir’s authenticity? For here we are, constantly going on about a taste of place, integrity in all aspects of production and varietal character, yet by law wines passing themselves off as being produced from one grape may have been adulterated through the adding of a good whack of essentially foreign juice. And the industry condones this.

Yes, this is permitted in other countries, as is the eating of dogs and tying kids to machines producing tennis shoes. And the current situation appears to be far better than a few decades back when a South African producer was allowed to add 50% of another grape variety without declaring it on the label.

But the bastardisation of single varietal labelled wine by 15% has no place in these current times when consumer rights are getting the recognition they deserve. What is a restaurant patron going to do when told that 15% of his or her crayfish cocktail consists of hake or yellowtail? Or you find out your tub of duck liver pâté contains a whack of ostrich? An engaging hissy-fit may lead to lodging a complaint to the consumer watchdogs, whose eyes are going beadier by the day.

So why should the industry expect consumers to pay over R100 for some wine labelled Shiraz while a good whack of the wine is not Shiraz but Cabernet Sauvignon, Ruby Cabernet or Petit Verdot to name a few possibilities? Especially when the leniency is not printed on the label.

With a few changes to be rung in over the next few months, the Wine and Spirits Board could do worse than to look into this situation. As quite frankly, the permissiveness is nothing short of misleading to the consumer who has the right to know if the content of a bottle is not what it claims to be.

 

 Thunder rolls as I hit Bloemfontein. Raining big fat dollops of splashing water. The sky is grey, the earth wet and the city smells like an oxygen tent inhabited by Sophia Loren.

First stop on my jaunt to Mangaung for the ANCΓÇÖs National Conference is Casa Van Zyl. Said Casa is inhabited by Jan, my second cousin, and his lovely Dorette. In wine circles they are possibly better known for being the parents of the Coco Chanel of South African wine-writing, one Jeanri-Tine van Zyl.

 

Children and animals can wreak havoc in a working environment. And both were present at the launch of the new eatery at Diemersdal, that top-quality wine Durbanville wine estate under stewardship of the Louw family.

The woman with the floppy hat and yellow facial sunscreen looked at me as if IΓÇÖd asked her to perform the Gangnam Style in her second-hand underwear. ΓÇ£DonΓÇÖt make such a noise,ΓÇ¥ she whispered. ΓÇ£We think weΓÇÖve got a LevaillantΓÇÖs Cisticola.ΓÇ¥

I peered over at the other members in her group. Most had the same floppy-hats and were donning binoculars of different sizes, coloured black or military green. ╬ô├ç┬úYou might have a Levaillant╬ô├ç├ûs Cisticola, but I╬ô├ç├ûve got a date with a cold bottle of sparkling wine,╬ô├ç┬Ñ I said, flooring the CitroΓö£┬╜n and sending a few Cisticolas, Furry Bummed Cisterians and Blue Hardened Tits – or whatever it is that bird-watchers find intriguing – flapping into the mountains above Plaisir de Merle.