87 pts Robert Parker Jr.'s The Wine Advocate - This wine’s sappy, saline finish leaves you happy to take the next sip.
Tasting
Notes
A juicy fruit packed smooth wine with a smorgasbord of red and black Summer berries, warm spice and toasty wood flavors. The wine has a lovely silky texture and a long smooth finish.
Food
Accompaniments
Pinotage is the best possible red wine in the world to pair with Mexican dishes such as Fajitas and Mole. It is also great with Cabrillo. The wine likes cumin seeds, and smoky ancho chilli flavours. It is also very good with other flavoursome American regional specialties such as with Carolina pulled pork and smoky Texas B.B.Q beef rib.
Awards,
Reviews and other Notes
87 pts Robert Parker Jr.'s The Wine Advocate This vintage – in a reversal from last year – I preferred Painted Wolf 2008 Pinotage to their Shiraz and Pinotage blend, which was irredeemably reduced, and slightly drying. With the pure Pinotage, one gets the classic smoky peppery notes of this variety (in principle synergistic with Syrah) with slightly sweaty and vegetal notes managing merely to add some complexity. What’s more, this wine’s sappy, saline finish leaves you happy to take the next sip. It ought to prove quite useful over at least the next couple of years, and benefits from taking on some air. #184
Winemaker Notes
The bulk of the Pinotage was destalked and fermented in tanks with staves. Malolactic and maturation was completed on staves. A small percentage of Pinotage and the Shiraz were fermented in small open fermenters and hand punched. They were pressed straight into wood and completed malolactic fermentation in barrel. The Shiraz component, 15% is 2008 wine, blended to give the wine a smoother mouth feel and a more sophisticated aroma and flavour. The wine has been given a light egg fining before being filtered and bottled. The grapes for this wine have been harvested from three vineyards, Kasteelsig in the Swartland and Leeuwenkuil in Agter Paarl and Southern Cross in the Simondium region of Paarl. Southern Cross is a site with granite soils whilst the other two sites have similar shale soils. None of the blocks from which the grapes have been sourced is irrigated. Grapes have been hand picked.
