WineNZ Summer 18-19 (1)

tastings | alternative sauvignon blancs
A view to rival Marlborough? Spectacular hills as a backdrop and sauvignon blanc in the foreground.
A South African of my
acquaintance is a big fan of
the republic’s wines – with
him it’s all pinotage this and
chenin blanc that.
But he also says their
sauvignon blanc is
every bit as good as
Marlborough’s. Sensing
an opportunity to prove
him absolutely wrong, I
suggested he enter some of his country’s
finest into our summer tasting and see how
it shaped up.
To give him his due he picked up the
challenge and we set about sourcing some
wine. And it was his lucky day. Because
many Kiwis think that Marlborough
sauvignon blanc is the only wine in the
world worth buying, there was plenty of
South African juice sitting round at discount
prices. In fact, we picked up half a dozen
assorted South African bottles for less than
$10 a pop from an importer in Auckland.
A downside was the wine was a couple
of years old. While it probably wasn’t made
with cellaring in mind, a year or two in the
bottle hadn’t done the wine any harm at all.
So how did it go? Two of the wines
went straight down the chute, failing to
make it into the star categories – but four
scored rather well.
Three had respectable three-star results.
Sincerely (Neil Ellis, Stellenbosch) and
Serengeti (Swartland Wines), both 2015
All roads in the Western Cape seem to lead to a winery – and many are producing interesting sauvignon blancs.
vintages. Also Diemersdal (Durbanville
Valley), a 2016 vintage.
But another of the wines put its hand up
to be taken very seriously. It was a Graham
Beck 2015 from the Game Reserve series.
The winery is located in Robertson
and was founded by the man the winery
is named after. The late Graham Beck was
a South African business magnate, stud
farmer and philanthropist. He was one of
the richest men in South Africa.
The winery is best known for its sparkling
wines, but also has a wide range of still
offerings.
The fruit for the sauvignon blanc comes
from near the coast in the Western Cape. It
is worth noting too that the Game Reserve
isn’t the top tier of the winery’s sauvignon
blanc range.
It may have been like a zebra in a horse
race, but it performed amazingly well. And
keep in mind these four Africans were
picked up for just under $10 each.
Barry Riwai was keeping a lookout
for foreigners and noted this as a non-
Marlborough wine, but he also noted alfalfa
sprouts and seaweed.
Matt Kirby had smoky notes, umami
and secondary mealy notes, while Simon
Nash also had smoky, lemon, wet stone
and seashell.
This wine had something that made the
boys perk up and have a good chin-wag.
So maybe there is an African alternative
to the standard sauvignon blanc that has
served Marlborough so well for the past
40 years – the equivalent of the iPhone
that brought down Nokia?
I guess we’ll need to wait a few
decades to see whether Greywacke’s Wild
Sauvignon style or Graham Beck’s smoky,
Islay peat version develop into something
that becomes a trend, or even becomes the
next big sauvignon blanc thing.
34 WineNZ Magazine | Summer 2018-19