Food suggestions

A rich and spicy wine which is great paired with French country dishes such as cassoulet or a beef daube Provençal. It is also delicious with grilled regional sausages e.g. Toulouse. Amazing with simply prepared dry-aged rump or ribeye steak, seasoned with a little sea salt and crushed black pepper and a few pan-fried mushrooms, ideally cep or porcini, and a dash of the best extra virgin olive oil.

Ageing potential

This Syrah is drinking well now and will improve in the bottle till 2020 and beyond.

The Vineyard

Our partner Billy Hughes grows organic grapes at Kasteelsig vineyard in the Swartland region. The grapes are dry farmed. Soil in the vineyard is primarily Glenrosa, a composite soil of decomposed shale with a little granite. Vines are 12 years old and the yield in 2013 was around 7 tons to the hectare.

Winemaking

The grapes were handpicked over a few days in late February 2013 into small baskets and taken to our cellar where they were destalked and gently crushed. We fermented the Syrah in small open bins where it was hand punched four times a day. We prefer the native yeast from the vineyard. The wine matured in French and Hungarian oak for a total of 20 months. We filled 10051 bottles.