What is Erika Obermeyer's secret?
Acceptance speech
This year sees two vintages of the Graham Beck Pheasants’ Run included in Wine magazine’s Sauvignon Blanc Top 10. The pattern was similar last year. If it isn’t luck, then what is winemaker Erika Obermeyer’s secret? It’s in her attitude.
Intelligent, loyal and energetic with a strong work ethic. High drive, versatile, biddable hunters with a keen sense of smell. Gentle but determined.” The German shorthaired pointer is also quite a zealous creature, as I discover during an interview with Erika Obermeyer, winemaker at Franschhoek’s Graham Beck wine cellar, who has two of these active animals – Milla and Rocky – that pounce on you the moment you walk into her kitchen.
It is no coincidence that Obermeyer decides to associate herself with this particular breed; during conversation with the successful 36-year-old, the similarities between the doting dogs and their owner become evident. I am reminded, more than once, of that old adage of a dog and its owner. Obermeyer is a tenacious winemaker. Colleagues describe her as a perfectionist “and absolutely fanatic about Sauvignon Blanc”.
Her background includes a stint at Stellenbosch wine farm Kleine Zalze, but she says that it was only in 2005, when she accepted a position as winemaker at Graham Beck Coastal, that she became a true master of her craft. Previously like a robot, she says, life was breathed into her when she joined the Graham Beck team. Here she enjoyed a short, but pivotal, grooming period with then cellarmaster Charles Hopkins, who left Graham Beck that same year to become cellarmaster at Durbanville cellar De Grendel. Speaking of that spell she says, “You are just as good as the people that cross your path and the chances you get, and Charles was an amazing mentor.”
Obermeyer has been garnering awards for her wines from the word go. In 2005, the maiden release of Pheasants’ Run Sauvignon Blanc won numerous awards, including SA Champion Sauvignon at the SA Young Wine Show. In 2008, she was awarded Landbouweekblad South African Woman Winemaker of the Year.
In typical fashion she credits the whole team – from her predecessor to the cellar hands and the formidable Mr Beck himself, leading pioneer of South African wine, who died earlier this year at the age of 80. “I am modest, yes, but I have a definite attitude,” she says, her blue eyes unwaveringly focused, and she is definitely not someone to shy away from credit.
Hopkins is similarly complimentary of Obermeyer. “She is tough, with solid knowledge from her studies that with time has developed into practical skills. She is well-organised, precise and hungry to do well.” He adds, “I believe she hasn’t always had an easy learning school. If you proceed through the ranks like she did, from being a young winemaker to her position now, then you appreciate things more, you learn more, and you don’t just get on with things.” Obermeyer further describes herself as “an individualist with a strong opinion” – a mindset that is well-suited to an environment which is associated with some of South Africa’s finest wine brands. Apart from the Graham Beck cellar in Franschhoek, the Beck portfolio includes Constantia’s Steenberg and the equally pristine Robertson Graham Beck cellar, where the bulk of the winery’s Cap Classique production takes place under guidance of cellarmaster Pieter Ferreira.
Pristine cellars, immaculate vineyards and state-of-the-art equipment provide winemakers with a solid foundation. All they need to do is add their skill to do justice to the name Graham Beck which, coupled with a long, proud history, has become closely associated with quality. It was, after all, the late Graham Beck’s vision to produce wines “of the highest possible standards,” and Obermeyer, who hates to disappoint, continues to meet these expectations.
“Mr Beck was an incredible person,” she says, “You didn’t want to let him down and, now that he is gone, quality is even more imperative.” Although Obermeyer is a multifaceted winemaker, involved in the production of the wide portfolio of award-winning Graham Beck still wines, it is still South Africa’s most popular grape – Sauvignon Blanc – that remains her favourite varietal.
A grape variety that is a slave to fashion (the latest styles being more tropical where green pepper nuances are so last year), Obermeyer has managed to rather produce a wine that is classical, and therefore ageless, in character. In fact, she likens this wine to Marilyn Monroe and, maybe, all things considered, had the Pheasants’ Run been a person it too might have had to wear oversized designer shades.
In style and popularity the Pheasants’ Run has, like the popular ‘50s movie star, amassed its own little cult following – also in terms of awards. Since its maiden release in 2005 this wine has established itself as being one of South Africa’s best Sauvignon Blancs – if not the best. In all its vintages Obermeyer has been called to the podium by various winemaking competitions and challenges, effectively illustrating a wine of reliable quality.
Of course the public has taken notice. The 2005 sold out in months, with subsequent vintages garnering similar attention. Due to its popularity, the decision was made by the farm to deliberately hold back stock of the 2009 vintage to meet competition entry requirements in 2010.
International wine authors have likened the Pheasants’ Run to a Sancerre, with descriptions praising its elegance and vibrancy, but it is the wine’s track record which reads like an Oscar-winning script: it is the only wine that has been one of the top wines in Wine magazine’s Sauvignon Blanc Top 10 since the competition’s inception in 2007. For the past two years, the Pheasants’ Run Sauvignon Blanc had two vintages in the Top 10. In 2009, the 2008 vintage scored 4½ Stars, with the 2009 achieving the ultimate accolade of 5 Stars. This year the pattern repeats with both 2009 and 2010 (both at 4½ Stars) making it into the Top 10 (see the full Top 10 on page 44). Surely for a winemaker it doesn’t get better than this?
Obermeyer answers without blinking. “This wine definitely put me on the map. But for me it is about having people enjoy the product, rather than the product’s double gold status or whatever.”
She talks of her love affair with the Sauvignon grape, “an intimate relationship” that has its roots in childhood memories of climbing fig trees on her father’s sheep farm in the Karoo (“I can vividly recall the ripening stages of figs and identify these smells in Sauvignon Blanc”), of specific vineyard blocks (“You can blindfold me and take me into the vineyard and I will be able to tell you where I am standing”) and, perhaps most importantly, aromas (“I am blessed with an over-developed sense of smell”).
In the making of this precious wine she relies on her gut feel, or what she calls her “sixth sense for Sauvignon Blanc”. Apart from its Marilyn Monroe qualities, the Pheasants’ Run has a defi nite blueprint: sugar-snap peas and green asparagus, with 2010 showing beautiful minerality with a quite voluptuous mouthfeel.
Is it safe to talk of an Erika-specific Sauvignon Blanc? She smiles coyly. “If I ever had to leave I think I will take the style with me.” After all, she adds, Graham Beck’s Chenins taste a bit like Kleine Zalze’s…
With lunch concluded, Obermeyer suggests we take the dogs out to ‘hunt’ as an excited Rocky and Milla start to dart through the house in anticipation. In the veld, amidst indigenous fynbos, a relaxed Obermeyer talks freely of subjects ranging from the superfluous to the serious: “I don’t blend [wine] when I am in a bad mood or when I am sad,” and then, pointing out a plant and looking at her dogs swimming in the dam, “Rocky was my angel, my rock, when I was going through a very difficult time of my life.” It is a markedly settled and composed Obermeyer that walks the farm today. Her gait indicative of someone who clearly knows where she is heading.
Obermeyer admits to a stage early in her winemaking career when she felt she wasn’t respected. “We’ve come a long way from a time when the South African wine industry was truly sexist.” But Obermeyer doesn’t care about living in a man’s world, as long as she can be a woman in it (to quote that famous movie star). She relates an incident where, shortly after her starting out at Graham Beck, a man walked up to her: “Are you the girlie who took over from Charles Hopkins?” he asked, adding, “You know he’s got big feet?” Obermeyer pauses with a shake of her head. “I’ve never tried to be a Charles, I am an Erika, and every day with every wine I make I try to be a better Erika – I am not arrogant, I am self-assured.” She calls her dogs. And I am reminded of that old adage of a dog and its owner again…
ERIKA IN SHORT
Born: 1975, in Sutherland
Educated: B.Sc. Honours in Wine Biotechnology at the University of Stellenbosch
Career: Worked at Kleine Zalze, Stellenbosch, from 1999 to 2004, before joining Graham Beck, Franschhoek, where she is currently employed. From 2003 she visited numerous cellars in Europe, US and Australia, doing harvests at Domaine Mollet-Maudry in Sancerre, La Tuilerie Des Combes in St Émilion and Michel Laroche in Béziers.
Achievements: Finalist in South African Woman Winemaker of the Year in 2005 and 2006. Winner of Lanbouweekblad Woman Winemaker of the Year 2008.
She says: “You should treat Sauvignon Blanc like it’s a woman. Give her flowers, attention and your credit card then she will do what you want. But boy, just one wrong step…”
About having an overdeveloped sense of smell: “I think in aromas. For example, when I cook I am driven by flavour profiles – not by recipes.”
Her favourite local Sauvignon Blanc (not hers): Cape Point Vineyards
