IN THIS ISSUE
Harvest 10
Harvest of the Viognier Block While
most of our overseas customers are still surrounded by the last breath
of winter, we [at the Southern Hemisphere] are facing the last warm
days of summer. We all can see autumn is coming and the beautiful
Western Cape vineyards are changing their colors. The whole landscape
is turning an ocean of yellow, light green and Bordeaux red, almost
like a Indian Summer.
This year’s harvest went by so quickly that
you really wonder what happened. All our grapes were brought in by our
hard working famers on the 17th of March 2010. We can say that the
quality seems very promising, with structured red wines and some fruity
white wine with nice acidity. Especially the granite Chenin Blanc from
our almost 33 year’s old block and our Viognier are turning out to be
very nice. Over the last few weeks we experienced some very intense
heat waves with almost no rainfalls. Therefore our irrigation system
pumped 7 days a week the water which we have collected in the rainy
winter days 2009 into the vineyards to provide our vines with the
necessary water to avoid stress and to ensure good fruit. All of our
white cultivars finished the alcohol fermentation, some
maturing already in French oak. Once again also the Sauvignon Blanc is
looking good this year. This results of a fantastic beginning of 2010
harvest because of the cool ripening conditions our wines went through.
We had some very moderate day time - and very low night time
temperatures of about 10-12 degrees Celsius which results in stable
acids as well as strong and healthy vines with typical flavors.
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| So we
were very blessed with very good harvest conditions to start off for
our white cultivars. We may hope for some light fruity summer wine with
aromatic flavors and not too high alcohol.
All our red cultivars are in the cellar and either still going through
alcohol fermentation or maturing in French oak barrels as well. Our
young fermented Pinotage shows already an exciting flavor profile. The
premium quality of the Rolands Reserve wines is currently maturing in
barrique and our Cabernet Sauvignon just finished the fermentation our
open fermentation tanks where it shows already deep flavors of black
current, blue berries and concentrated structure.
Our Malbec bloc got harvested by hand under optimal ripeness therefore
we decided to produce a real Blanc de Noir this year. We may produce a
fine white wine with a fruity flavor profile but low in alcohol and not
too high residual sugar, something new to look forward.
We remain very optimistic about this year’s harvest and we hope to
achieve the goals we have set ourselves beginning of 2009.
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PRO-Wein - Wine Exhibitions
Like
we use to do over the last few years, our Wine Estate participated once
again this month at Germanys biggest Wine Exhibition. PRO-Wine, in
Düsseldorf, is the international leading trade fair for the wine and
spirit business but it is for trade visitors only. Connoisseurs are of one and the same opinion: If you want to be
successful on the international wine market, you need to go to
Düsseldorf, because here you will meet the “Who’s Who” of the sector.
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| The tasting provided a platform for our wines to be put in front of
international leading industry figures and wine lovers. We always use
the opportunity to meet our customers personally as well and to try
some of our new released wines. The Pro-Wein 2010 was a success for
Seidelberg and besides the “normals” trade business you could see that
everyone is very excited about the upcoming World Cup in South Africa
(only 3 months left) now as well.
We are all very energized and we
believe that this a few weeks will do
good for the reputation of South African wines worldwide. |
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SOUTH AFRICAN AIRLINES
 Seidelberg Rose
Over
the last period of time we recently received a number of awards and
especially the latest award is one of its kind. Our Seidelberg family
is exceptionally excited to announce that from this year on the
Seidelberg will fly at South African Airlines Company. So look out for
our 2010 Seidelberg Rose which has been listed on SAA and will be
served as from May this year.
The Rose is a new category on economy
class flights. This success follows a numerous of hard competitions which our wines
needed to stand firm to finally enter the doors to the global business
traveler world.
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The Seidelberg Rose is the result of a fantastic
harvest for our Estate. Reasonable cool ripening conditions allowed us
to pick berries with a good acid and sugar level as well as typical
flavors. The wine is a blend of our Red Muscadel and Malbec grapes.
After picking the grapes by hand, the berries received a 12 hour skin
contact to extract the typical bouquet of Muscadel, before pressing and
settling. After the alcohol fermentation the different components were
blended. The wine shows delicate rose pink in colour with light orange
reflections. Flavors of raspberry and wild strawberries with some spicy
undertones, full bodied and a taste of honey with harmonious long
refreshing aftertaste.
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OMMIBERG - 2010
The so called “Round the Rock” – Ommiberg festival is one of the most
popular local wine festivals in March. We participated the 3rd time and
we are growing. More and more guests are joining the festival year by
year. The
event only takes place on wine farms who are situated around the slopes
of the granite Paarl Mountain. Ommiberg was unique opportunity for all
our guests to taste our first wines the 2010 vintages straight out of
the tank, unfiltered and in the middle of the harvest time. |
| The event
paired the wine with creative adaptions of traditional onion tart
besides other very delicious gourmet offerings. Our customers could
enjoy traditional harvest activities such as grape stomping competition
and tractor drives along the Paarl Mountain. It was great atmosphere.
People chilled on the lawn, tasted our young wines, listened to some
soft tunes of live playing musicians and had a fabulous time. We are
all looking forward to next year’s Ommiberg. We are looking forward
seeing you there again!
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