Radford Dale Stellenbosch The Renaissance of Chenin Blanc 2016 (South Africa)

Description

Through profound understanding of this vineyard, rather than manipulating the wine, winemakers have been able to create a wine that reflects its site through freshness, elegance, finesse and purity. Often shunned and disrespected by winemakers and consumers alike, there is, in certain worthy quarters, an ascending realisation of the tremendous potential of this grape, Chenin Blanc - South Africa's most noble grape. As devotess of true character and finesse often swim upstream against the populous tide, a fresh generation of Chenin Blanc producers is bringing to the surface some of the most interesting, bright, mineral and idiosyncratic wines of the Cape. The Renaissance of Chenin Blanc is all about subtlety and finesse. It is driven by its citrus fruit spectrum and has a wonderful refreshing saltiness.

The fruit for this wine is grown in a single block of old, unirrigated bush vine Chenin on the foot slopes of the Helderberg Mountain, facing South East across False Bay. These vines grow high on a steep slope in slightly decomposed granite soils with patches of pure quartz near the top. These gnared, old vines never yield a big crop (35hL/Ha or St/Ha), but because of this, the berries and bunches are small and the fruit is wonderfull concentrated. The 2016 vintage was smaller and the winemakers had to harvest faster then previous years. They experienced a dry winter but sufficient cold units had been accumulated for the full breaking of dormancy. Above average warmer weather during August continued throughout Spring/Summer and casued the grapes to mature early so the harvest kicked off one to two weeks earlier than usual.

The grapes were whole bunch pressed and the free-run juice settled for two days before being poured into barrel. Alcoholic fermentation was carried out entirely in old oak barrel (using only natural ambient yeast) for 8-10 weeks under cool conditions (fermentation peaking at about 18 degrees). Malolactic fermentation was inhibited by the cold. The wine was kept on its primary lees throughout maturation, racked out of barrel after about 9 months, assembed and then settled for a month. This wine was bottled slightly earlier than previous vintages, because it reached iots full potential with regards to barrel maturation a little earlier than other years.