ad Club Select Sauvignon Blanc 2009
“Thanks to healthy vineyards and helpful weather, this harvest lives in our memories as the best and easiest harvest ever including our first Merlot and Cabernet Franc from the new plantings. Our Club and Jacus both celebrated their 10th birthdays with Nitida. Warren Swaffield took over Cassia. We won the inaugural “Best Producer” Trophy for the most awarded wines at the Michelangelo Awards. We appointed Cathy White as our new Johannesburg agent. Bernhard’s Nitida Decorus Sauvignon Blanc received the highest bid for an unwooded white at the CWG Auction. New labels for our standard range of wines.”
Tasting Notes
Cascading nettles and flinty limestone rests on rounded asparagus, fresh grass and a mouthful of peaches and gooseberries.
Winemaker Comments
This was a particularly easy year to manage in the vineyards. Normal levels of vegetative growth meant simple canopy management - with a bit of leaf break out on the east side (morning sunshine) to encourage development of fruity thiols while protecting our resident pyrazines from the harsh afternoon (western) sun. Volumes were a bit down again this year, so we picked from a variety of vineyards in 6 different cool climate sites, plus we picked in two time slots, at different degrees of ripeness and the healthy grapes meant we could allow 24 hours skin contact - all contributing to a wide spectrum of flavours. The year allowed us to make our favourite more pyrazine style sauvignon blanc which holds well with good acids. The Club Select comes from a tank selection and blending of 3 tanks out of the 2009 sauvignon blanc. In selection we were particularly looking for tanks which expressed a rather purist, style of sauvignon blanc reflecting Durbanville cool climate characteristics.
