Nederburg: 2008 Shiraz Challenge winner, Paarl
By winning the Lexus Shiraz Challenge 2008, Paarl winery Nederburg proves once again that the large volumes it produces are no hindrance to quality. Mike Froud reports.
It might not be all things to all men – not yet anyway – but Nederburg Wines of Paarl are looking and tasting better and better, appealing to an increasingly broad spectrum of wine lovers, and having one of their most successful years at the award podiums. Just two months back, Nederburg cellarmaster Razvan Macici and white wine maker Tariro Masayiti stepped up to accept the trophy for the most successful producer at the 2008 Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show. Now Macici and his red wine lieutenants have clinched the Lexus Shiraz Challenge with Nederburg The Winemaster’s Reserve 2006.
Watch this space! The year is far from over, and Macici has his sights set on more great things. Something he’d love to achieve during his career is to emulate one of his predecessors, Günter Brözel, in winning the Winemaker of the Year trophy at the International Wine & Spirit Competition (IWSC) in London – Brözel twice won the title for Nederburg’s overall performance at this, the world’s longest-running wine competition, founded in 1969.
If Nederburg has something holding it back in the marketplace, it has to do with perceptions regarding top-end quality, perceptions that small is (more) beautiful… “We are victims of our own commercial success,” says Macici, insisting that bigger can indeed be better. “We are South Africa’s Penfolds,” he says, comparing Nederburg’s holding company, Distell, to the Australian mega-producer whose portfolio includes Grange, one of the world’s icon wines. “Nobody accuses them of being too big…”
He elaborates: “The grapes at our disposal are unique in the SA wine industry. In fact, it would be unacceptable if a cellar with access to what we have in terms of the variety and quality of grapes, the number, type and location of the growers supplying to Nederburg according to our strict requirements, failed to produce some of the best wines in the country. If anything, our size gives us an advantage, quality-wise.”
R70 million was spent on a new cellar in recent years and Macici talks about cleaner, more upfront fruit, softer tannins and less reductive flavours among the improvements in the wines. He also credits Distell’s chief winemaker, Linley Schultz, with having led much of the change at Nederburg since joining the group in late 2001.
“We changed everything a little, some things a lot,” says Schultz. “A change of style has come with a change of winemaker, and across the board we’ve introduced quality management and analytical control,” he adds before getting technical. “There’s also been continuity in respect of the best of previous grape suppliers and access to new, top-quality viticultural sites.”
Nederburg is excited about what the future holds following the launch last year of Ingenuity Red and Ingenuity White as the flagships currently available to the public ex-cellar.
Next year, to celebrate two centuries of winemaking, Nederburg will launch another special range comprising two red wines, probably a Cabernet Sauvignon and a Shiraz, and two white wines, probably a Sauvignon Blanc and a Chardonnay. Then, in 2010, no doubt timed to coincide with the World Cup Football tournament in South Africa, Nederburg is planning to launch a super-premium red blend, also from the 2007 vintage. Macici is secretive but admits that this is “our attempt to produce and bottle an icon”.
It’s interesting that none of these newcomers will be confined to the Nederburg Auction catalogue. Anybody will be eligible to buy them from the cellar or retail stockists. Which will raise the eyebrows of those who’ve always held that the best from Nederburg sells under the Private Bin Auction labels – as was the case with their D234 Sauvignon Blanc 2007, judged best unwooded Sauvignon at the Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show this year, now pretty much only available from the Cape Town Fish Market group of restaurants which bought most of the D234 that came under the hammer at last year’s auction.
In terms of single-varietal wines, Macici suggests that Sauvignon Blanc and Shiraz are what defines Nederburg. Both have performed consistently well in recent years, with the Shiraz perhaps responsible for more glint in the display cabinet – the 2005 Manor House having triumphed at IWSC 2007 in London and the 2006 Winemaster’s Reserve now coming out on top in an impressive line-up of fi nalists as the winner of the fifth SA Shiraz Challenge convened by WINE magazine, this year focusing on wines from the 2005 and 2006 vintages.
Winemaster’s Reserve 2006
So what makes The Winemaster’s Reserve 2006 special? A touch of Romanian oak, for one thing. Nederburg uses it together with French and American oak for its Shiraz – new, second- and third-fill barrels. “We’ve been doing so since 2004,” says Macici, himself a Romanian… It contributes “an aromatic character and cinnamon and clove flavours” to Nederburg’s Shiraz (it’s also used in their Pinotage and Sangiovese winemaking).
And who would have guessed that while some of the fruit is from Paarl, Durbanville and Stellenbosch, the largest proportion of the grapes for the Shiraz Challenge winner came from eight-year-old vines in Philadelphia (north of Durbanville, off the N7 en route to Malmesbury)?
Released in 2007, the 2006 Winemaster’s Reserve will be followed by the release of the 2007 vintage in a couple of months’ time. It’s big in volume, at around 550 000 litres (over 60 000 cases, well over 700 000 bottles), but exported around the world and selling fast.
And at a great price: R57 ex-cellar, but as low as R45 at SA supermarkets including Pick n Pay and Checkers. By far the best value Shiraz on the local market right now…
As for the difference between The Winemaster’s Reserve and Nederburg Manor House Shiraz at nearly double the price, Macici accepts that there might be some confusion about the positioning from the public’s viewpoint. He describes the Challenge winner as classic, with strong varietal character, lower alcohol, more softness than the Manor House, more American oak (making it slightly sweeter on paper if not on the palate) and earlier approachability, despite having similar ageing potential. 12 months in barrel. Alc 14.1% R/S 3.7g/l T.A. 5.4g/l pH 3.5.
“I don’t want smokiness with Nederburg Shiraz,” says Macici, who feels the style is unique. “Definitely not Barossa, not Australian. It’s closer to French: riper and softer, spicier and more voluptuous.” According to Nederburg red wine maker Wim Truter who in 2007 took over from Elunda Basson, now at the JC le Roux bubbly cellar in Stellenbosch: “The richness on the nose and palate of The Winemaster’s Reserve is more similar to Rhône.”
If it’s possible, blending is even more important with Winemaster’s Reserve than with Manor House, which in future could undergo a label tweak to specify Wine of Origin Philadelphia (instead of simply South Africa, Western Cape or Coastal). We’re assured that all of the winning wine was made, blended, wooded and put in holding tanks at the same time before bottling – relevant considering that the bottling took place on different dates spanning a number of months, during which there was a name change from simply Nederburg Shiraz in the “classic range” to Nederburg The Winemaker’s Reserve in the new livery it sports today.
“The wine is exactly the same, one blend,” says Macici of the transition in explaining why at the time of going to print there was nothing about the new name and look on the Nederburg website, and to put at rest the minds of those concerned about batch variation.
PAARL ROCKS
Where to eat and stay in Paarl, as recommended by the Nederburg cellarmaster:
RESTAURANTS
Bosman’s at Grande Roche, Plantasie Street:
international cuisine; R350 for two courses excl
drinks; Tel 021 863 5100
La Romantica, 166 Main Road: Italian; R100 for
two courses excl drinks; Tel 021 872 9283
Marc’s, 129 Main Road: Lebanese, Greek, Southern
French; R130 for two courses excl drinks;
Tel 021 863 3980
Pontac Manor, 16 Zion Street: contemporary
international; R150 for two courses excl drinks;
Tel 021 872 0445
ACCOMMODATION
Grande Roche, Plantasie Street: from R1 800 per
suite; Tel 021 863 5100
Pontac Manor, 16 Zion Street: from R415pp
sharing; Tel 021 872 0445
SUNSET CONCERTS
The 2008 Nederburg Sunset Concerts offer superb
music, finger suppers and top Nederburg wines.
Tickets to dinner concerts in the manor house are
R125pp. Picnic concerts on the lawns at R60pp,
with picnic platters at R65pp (or bring your own).
Nederburg wines, coffee and cool drinks on sale
(no BYO). 5pm starting time.
24 AUGUST – THE DEVICH TRIO
Dinner concert. Hungarian pianist Hanna Devich,
Dutch cellist Jasper Havelaar and SA violinist Sarah
Oates play Schostakovich’s Piano Trio No 2 in D minor
and Dvorak’s Piano Trio No 3 in F minor Op 65.
28 SEPTEMBER – GYPSY LIFE
Dinner concert. Minette du Toit-Pearce
(mezzo-soprano), Anina Wasserman (soprano),
Zorada Temmingh and Elna van der Merwe (piano).
Gypsy music as interpreted by Brahms and Dvorak.
26 OCTOBER – UCT BIG BAND
Picnic concert. UCT Big Band conducted by Mike
Campbell performs the music of Frank Sinatra, Glenn
Miller, Count Basie and more.
To book call 021 809 8106
or email ialbers@distell.co.za.
