The Legend of the Warwick Wedding Cup

Warwick 'The First Lady' Cabernet Sauvignon debuts at Stew Leonards in NY, NJ & CT

Look at the cool banners that are hanging above the stocks of wine!

C'mon all you wine lovers in Yonkers, Danbury, Newington, Newark & Springfield.

Is Webwine making us all Stupid?

By Mike Ratcliffe

Twitter, if used correctly, is in effect an online filter perfectly tailored to providing you with immediate relevant connection to any particular world that you choose. You can reduce your volume, increase it. You can broaden the depth of info that you receive and you can narrow it by defining what you want to hear. When you repeatedly hear something that you don't like - you can unfollow/delete and never received that info again. twitter is perfectly Darwinian in that only the strongest sources of info should survive. Of course this only really applies to people that apply their minds to utilising the Twitter strengths intelligently. Conversely there is a very strong Machiavellian tendency from some twitter users/pushers/marketers to manipulate the environment that they portray and create a false sense of reality that they would like their followers to buy into. Again, most intelligent Twitter practioners will eventually smell the distinct aroma of BS and simply unfollow. For my own purposes, twitter is fast becoming a prime source of information as I have a very clear vision of what I am trying to get out of it. But Twitter is really a windo into a world of information rather than the information itself. Twitter is a conveyor belt bringing me what I want - and I control Twitter - not the converse.

Jenny Ratcliffe launches new 'WINE STYLE' magazine at Warwick

The Warwick Team is going on tour to Durban and Johannesburg. We will be hosting a couple of 'rocking' wine dinners. A few tickets remaining. Join me

Click on the link to enlarge for details.

Warwick 'The First Lady' Cabernet Sauvignon included into the Wine Enthusiast 'Top 100' value wines in the World for 2010

Mike Ratcliffe was the auctioneer at the Jan Kriel School charity auction - raised R317,000 after expenses

The beauty of new springtime growth in the Cabernet vineyards

Mike Ratcliffe
Warwick Estate & Vilafonte
P.O.Box 2 Elsenburg, 7607, South Africa

FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER www.twitter.com/mikeratcliffe

Trilogy Recommendation

Warwick Estate Trilogy 2007

Stellenbosch, South Africa

Dry Red (Cork), 14.5% abv

Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Merlot are aged for 20 months in mostly older French oak. Big plush nose, with that very characteristic herbal note that is part of the Warwick terroir. Strong minty and eucalyptus character. Thick, sweet, ripe fruit powers through and this is close to being a blockbuster, but it retains finesse and savoury bite. Find on http://www.wine-searcher.com/ 

Score: 93/100

http://www.thewinegang.com/

Warwick Wine Dinners at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse

Follow or Leader at Warwick Estate?

Lordy lord, I’ve been sick! I hate, hate, hate losing my tastebuds – if you work in the wine industry, it’s actually one of the scariest of things (what if they don’t come back?) so I will be highly delighted when cheese tastes like cheese, broccoli tastes like broccoli and wine tastes like wine once more.

I fell sick almost immediately after going to Warwick last week – and I refuse to believe the two are related. In fact, I am almost sure that the delicious food I ate and the fantastic wine I drank probably warded off a much worse bout of flu than I have actually ended up with. There was no real occasion for the lunch – just a general get-together for some media and trade and a chance to serve a few small sheeps’ legs to us all.

 

We started off with a round-up of wines which Mike Ratcliffe, MD of Warwick, says he doesn’t generally put into tastings. Following on from our Twitter fest just a few days before, I was hoping for more Cab Franc as it was so yum, but instead, we started with Sauvignon and Chardonnay, moved on to Pinotage and finished up with the new releases of Three Cape Ladies and Trilogy.

I must say, I find Warwick’s wines to be almost universally satisfying. The Chardonnay is beautifully balanced – plenty of wood to be sure, but lots of fruit, good acidity and all very seamlessly integrated. I found it a tad bizarre that the Chardonnay was in a cork closure whilst the Pinotage was in screwcap but Mike didn’t really have any good reason why – it’s just what they thought they could sell and he was happy to follow the market.

In fact, if anything was strangely incongruous about the day, it was how much Mike kept coming back to the idea of being a follower rather than a leader. For a start, I’m not sure how much I believe him, but secondly, I think he is seriously depriving the wine industry of a figure of intelligence, forethought and stature by taking such a back seat. As the lunch wore on and Mike spoke of his foray into the world of the Cape Blend, of his decision to keep labelling the Pinotage as Old Bush Vines despite the fact that much of it isn’t, the whole screwcap thing – all rather strange and a tad disingenuous from someone who probably owns the pulse, let alone merely has his finger on it.

But enough modesty – Mike’s wines can speak for themselves whatever the circumstances – and when he started digging around in the wine library with a rabidly thirsty Christian Eedes (www.whatidranklastnight.co.za) and Roland Peens (www.winecellar.co.za), it was clear that I should have booked a taxi or used Goodfellas (www.gfellas.com) instead of spitting and driving as usual. Perhaps if I had done, I might have fought off infection for another day. Suffice it to say that the 1999 Chardonnay was awesome, but not quite as good as the older Trilogys or Pinotages with the lamb shank. Who cares if the sheep have to hop? Not me.

It was a lovely day at Warwick. Whether he’s being modest or not, Mike is a generous and warm host with plenty to show off on the farm and plenty to be proud of in all he and his family have achieved. The business is booming – all in all, Mike attributes an additional R2.5 million turnover to the World Cup and expects to build on that this coming summer - especially in the restaurant with their gourmet picnics and family-friendly attitude. If you haven’t been to the farm for a while, go and take a look. Whether they’re following fashion or setting it, there’s plenty to see, drink and do with the Ratcliffe family this year.

Drunk, Cathy Marston

Warwick and Vilafonte go on tour!

Fantastic news - we are going on tour! Together with Cathryn Henderson, Editor of Wine Magazine, I will be hosting three incredible Warwick and Vilafonte food and wine dinners across the country over the next 2 months. Enjoy an all-star line-up of our much loved wines paired with a five-course tasting menu, prepared by top chefs at 3 of the hottest and trendiest new venues. Why not put together a table with your mates?

Tickets cost R450 per person and include wine and gratuity. Book now by calling 0860 100 205 or email subs@ramsaymedia.co.za For more information, please contact Jane Eedes on 021 530 3308 janee@ramsaymedia.co.za

Join me for some great wine, awesome food and lots of fun.

Mike Ratcliffe

Is Franc the Future for Cape Wine?

Posted on August 26, 2010 by Cathy Marston © Cape Times Friday 27th August 2010

For many winelovers, Cab is king. But after an incredible tasting last week, I think that the real question we should all be asking is – which Cab are we talking about? Cabernet Sauvignon is one of the most well-travelled grapes in the world, happily putting down roots in both Northern and Southern hemispheres, making wines in practically every winemaking country there is, oomphing up Chiantis and spicing up Cape Blends. But behind every great grape, there is an even greater one and in this case, it's a variety called Cabernet Franc. And that was the focus of our tasting at the Cru Café in the Cape Quarter last week. DNA tests have now proved that Cabernet Sauvignon is actually the love child of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc. Both Sauvignon and Cabernet Sauvignon have enjoyed massive success over the years (if you want to try a few, then head for the Wine Concepts Seductive Sauvignon Festival tonight at the Vineyard Hotel. Call 021 671 9030 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 021 671 9030 end_of_the_skype_highlighting for tickets) but Cabernet Franc has rather languished in the shallows of obscurity. It is used in Bordeaux and makes all the red wines in the Loire Valley, but hasn't really achieved the success of its more famous child. Last week's tasting set out to prove that all Cab Franc needed was a new country in which to showcase its talents, and various top wine Twitterers and twittering winemakers convened to discuss the topic. We were joined online by internationally-acclaimed wine guru, Jancis Robinson, along with another celebrated UK journalist, Tim Atkin, both adding their 10c to the discussion. Leading the tasting and towering over us all, both literally and vinously, was Bruwer Raats of Raats Family Wines, widely considered one of the finest Cabernet Franc winemakers in the world. The tasting covered Bruwer's wines and another Cape Cab Franc legend from Warwick Estate, and included newer entries to the market such as Haut Espoir's fascinating versions made from high-altitude vineyards in Franschhoek (these were barrel samples and will only be released in a few years time – get yourself on the list now!). The Signal Hill Cab Franc from new vineyards in Kalk Bay – only 86m away from the sea – was particularly interesting. Owner/winemaker Jean-Vincent Ridon explained that there was so much salt on the grapes, he originally thought he would have to wash them before foot-stomping, but eventually decided to leave them as they were, creating a perfumed wine which perfectly expresses its terroir. One awesome wine followed another, each one showing style, individuality and elegance, each one confirming our growing opinions that Cabernet Franc has got an amazing future in South Africa – I was glad that I'd booked those lovely drivers from Goodfellas (www.gfellas.co.za) to take me home because there was very little spitting going on anywhere around the table! Everyone was passionate about this variety either as a single cultivar which is what Bruwer and Jean-Vincent believe or as part of a blend such as Warwick Trilogy – Neil Moorhouse from Zorgvliet is punting Cab Franc/Merlot blends as ones to watch so remember where you heard it first!

For those of you who've never tried a Cabernet Franc, it is fairly similar to a Cabernet Sauvignon in that it generally has lots of dense, dark black fruits and sturdy tannins, but Cabernet Franc also has a spicy green edge to it which can manifest itself as herbal, perfumed and aromatic giving multiple layers of flavour and complexity. If you want to give it a go, then entry-level priced ones include L'Avenir at R50, Zorgvliet at R65, Eikendal at R70 and Signal Hill Constantia Cab Franc also at R70. And if, you've already been converted to Cabernet Franc then you can do no better than a bottle of Warwick at R235, the fascinating Signal Hill Kalk Bay at R250 or the Raats Family at R280. Give one of them a go this weekend – I've tasted the future, and the future's Franc!
Cathy is wine editor of www.Food24.com. For more information visit www.cathymarston.co.za or follow her on Twitter @CathyMarston

The story of the Warwick Wedding Cup

Mike presenting a vertical tasting of Warwick Trilogy & Vilafonte 'Series C' at the home of Derek Prout-Jones

Free bottle of Warwick 'The First Lady' Cabernet Sauvignon this womens day long weekend

WOMEN’S DAY PROMOTION AT WARWICK

Celebrate this Women’s Day weekend at Warwick Wine Estate in the company of The ‘Blue Lady’, the ‘Black Lady’ Syrah, the ‘First Lady’ and the remarkable ‘Three Cape Ladies’. With every lunch booking throughout the weekend all Ladies will receive a FREE bottle of Warwick ‘The First Lady’ 2008 and all the 'little ladies' will receive something sweet.

WINTER BISTRO

In addition to our well-known Gourmet picnics, we are now offering heart-warming meals from the Bistro including our renowned Lamb shank with Cabernet jus. Meals can be enjoyed next to our roaring fires or in the forest courtyard and washed down with an exceptional glass of red wine.

Bring your kids, family and friends and enjoy some true Warwick hospitality. Meals are available Wednesday to Sunday. Bistro hours: 12:00 – 15:00. To make a booking please call: 021 884 3144 or visit@warwickwine.com. Click HERE for a map to Warwick - just 35 minutes from Cape Town.

Receiving the enormous British Airways cheque as part of winning the small business development grant

A REPORT ON THE FOOD & WINE BLOGGERS CLUB MEETING LAST NIGHT

Written by Chris van Ulmenstein and posted to her blog www.whalecottage.com/blog/

Free-lance writer and second-most read South African food blogger Jane-Anne Hobbs, writing the Scrumptious South Africa blog, described food bloggers as “desperate for attention” at the Food and Wine Bloggers’ Club meeting last night, and their genre of writing can be called “vanity publishing”, she said.  The bloggers present felt that this description probably applies to bloggers across the board! 

The Food & Wine Bloggers’ Club was started earlier this year, and “pairs” a different food blogger and a wine blogger every month.   The wines of the Wine Blogger are tasted, and Warwick/Vilafonte’s Mike Ratcliffe brought along his Warwick Professor Black, the unique Warwick Blue Lady without vintage, and Vilafonte Series M 2006 (the highest rated Merlot blend according to Wine Spectator), for the bloggers to taste.  Food was served by Cafe Max.  Meetings are informal, and questions are answered during the two-hour meeting, encouraging fledgling bloggers to obtain input and tips from more experienced bloggers.

Warwick 'The Blue Lady'
non-vintage

Jane-Anne said that through social media, “opinion has been democratised”, creating a serious threat for traditional media, with their short lead times in publishing restaurant reviews, or food information, compared to traditional magazine and newspaper publishing, and this is leading to tension between the two media types.  She started her blog three years ago, and it reflects her love for cooking and for developing recipes.   While one may not get financial reward out of a blog, especially if one does not accept advertising, which is Jane-Anne’s policy (nor does she accept freebies), she feels that she is adding value to her readers, and she herself receives emotional, intellectual and entertainment satisfaction from writing her blog.  She advised that food blogs must focus on accuracy in terms of ingredients and method of preparation, but also in terms of spelling and grammar. 

Online integrity is vital, and one must trust one’s palate in expressing what one experiences, even if it is not the popular view, one blogger said.  One should track one’s performance, and Jane-Anne advised that referring to, and tagging, names of chefs such as Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson and Gordon Ramsay leads to increased web traffic.  She also advised that one “should find one’s voice” through the blog, and allow one’s readers to “get to know you”, and one’s personality should come through, whatever one’s communication style might be.  While content is king, a “yummy and descriptive” headline is vital in attracting readers into the content, and photographs should be of a “reasonable quality”.   Jane-Anne feels that it is sad to see so many young people’s idea of food and cooking being shaped by chefs and cookery book writers such as Ramsay, Lawson and Oliver, without them having exposure to a more classic cooking culture.  With her Scrumptious blog, Jane-Anne hopes to broaden their cooking knowledge.  

Mike Ratcliffe is probably the most experienced social media marketing wine marketer, and impressed with the different tools he referred to and uses: Blogging, Twitter, FourSquare, Twideo, Google Maps Latitude, and Nice to Meet You.   He has opted out of Facebook, due to the lack of control.   He writes a Vilafonte and a Warwick blog, being the Managing Partner of the former brand, and the Managing Director of the latter brand.  Vilafonte grapes are grown near Sante Wellness, between Paarl and Franschhoek, and the wines are made in a state-of-the-art venue at Bosman’s Crossing in Stellenbosch, while the Warwick wines are made the traditional way by Mike’s mother Norma on their farm.   Her 25th vintage celebration will take the Warwick wines around the world with 40 dinners, at which 10 vintages of their wines will be tasted.   Mike is an irregular blogger, as he travels a lot, and finds he has more time to blog when he travels.  He “leans to controversy” in what he writes, he says, yet he will not pick a fight, and will step back in a fight.  He complimented www.wines.co.za for their platform on which he is encouraged to write, creating huge exposure to their 40000 unique readers per month.    

Mike advised bloggers to be responsible in their blogging, as one influences views.  One must check one’s information sources, and not use a blog as a platform for retaliation.  If one disappoints one’s readers, they will no longer follow the blogger.  A blog is successful when one is passionate about one’s topic, and about writing.   Twitter is on a growth trend, he feels, and positional tweeting (crowdsourcing) will be introduced soon.  Mike uses traditional marketing communication media too, such as advertising and PR, and the 2000 members of the Warwick Wine Club are an important testing and tasting ground for new wines developed.   He claims that his marketing is spontaneous and dynamic, but one gets the impression that Mike Ratcliffe knows exactly what he is doing in marketing his brands, and is acknowledged by his peers in this respect.   He was praised by a fellow blogger as a professional.  

The next Food and Wine Bloggers’ Club meeting is on Wednesday 18 August, and will “pair” Sam Wilson of Food24 Blogs, and Rob Armstrong of Haut Espoir in Franschhoek.  Bookings can be made by e-mailing info@whalecottage.com

South African Sauvignon Blanc is full of suprises

A brillaint article by Jamie Goode and posted on http://www.wineofsa.com/

South Africa is full of surprises. Before the World Cup tournament, most commentators were expecting trouble as the world’s soccer fans arrived en masse. The challenges of logistics and security were deemed to be too great, and many were predicting disaster, but instead the tournament went without a glitch. Overall, it was a great advertisement for the rainbow nation – even the Dutch thuggery in the final as they tried to kick the Spanish off the pitch couldn’t spoil things.

Warwick Estate
'Professor Black'
Sauvignon Blanc

In terms of wine, probably the biggest surprise about South Africa is how well it has done with Sauvignon Blanc. It’s a variety that flourishes in cool conditions, and if you were to sit down with a chart showing the growing degree days (a measure of average temperature) of South Africa’s key wine regions, Sauvignon wouldn’t be your first choice grape for planting. But winegrowers have managed to find combinations of vineyard sites and soils where Sauvignon can flourish, have managed these vineyards well and worked hard in the cellar, and as a result Sauvignon is now South Africa’s fastest rising variety.

Back in 2002 it accounted for 6.7% of vineyard area; by the end of 2009 this had risen to 9.3%. There is now more Sauvignon than Chardonnay in South Africa, and the only white varieties more widely planted are Chenin Blanc and Colombard (most of which is used for brandy production). It may surprise you to learn that with 9446 hectares of Sauvignon Blanc planted, South Africa now ranks third, behind France and New Zealand, in the Sauvignon league table.

Sauvignon Blanc is an interesting grape variety, because it’s probably the one where we have a better handle on the science underpinning how the viticulture and winemaking affect the flavour than for any other variety. There are two groups of chemicals that are considered to be key to the flavour of Sauvignon Blanc.

The first is the methoxypyrazines. These are responsible for the herbal grassy/green pepper flavours and aromas, and are an important part of Sauvignons varietal character. If you want to train your nose and palate to recognize methoxypyrazine, then take a green pepper and cut it open. That’s methoxypyrazine, and in high levels it can be quite pungent and even unpleasant. It’s produced by the grapes, and levels are initially high during the early stages of ripening, falling as the grapes get riper. Viticulturalists have been working hard on ways of managing the grape vine canopy (the leaves) to get just the right level of methoxypyrazine when the grapes are ripe and ready to pick. These methoxypyrazines are stable and the levels remain unchanged during fermentation and ageing.

The second is the thiols. These are sulfur-containing compounds produced during fermentation by the yeasts, from precursors present in the grapes. They’re closely related to compounds that can cause problems in wine, so it was a surprise to find out that three thiols – 4MMP, 3MH and 3MHA – are actually responsible for attractive fruity notes in Sauvignon Blanc. Their typical signature is passionfruit, grapefruit and boxwood, and if you want to get a handle on what they smell like, take a passionfruit, slice it in half and take a good sniff. Thiols aren’t all that stable, and can be lost with ageing. Because they are seen as desirable in Sauvignon Blanc, a lot of work is taking place trying to identify the precursors that the yeasts use to make them from, and then finding out ways of enhancing these precursor levels in the grape by intervention in the vineyard.

The key to successful Sauvignon Blanc is getting a balance between these more tropical fruity aromas and the green herbal notes, and this is what South Africa seems to be doing very effectively. Part of this comes down to growing the grape in the right place, either in cooler regions (such as Constantia, Darling or Elgin) or in cooler spots (such as south-facing vineyard blocks) in otherwise quite warm regions. But it is interesting to note that even among the leading examples of South African Sauvignon there are stylistic differences.

Perhaps the biggest difference in style relates to the level of greenness, contributed by the methoxypyrazines. Some people just can’t get enough of them, while others can only tolerate them in small quantities. A little grassy, green pepper character is an important element of Sauvignon style, adding freshness and focus to the wine. Sometimes, however, this character can be dominant, resulting in overtly green herbal wines. Still, the high-methoxypyrazine style is very successful with some consumers. An example would be Springfield Estate’s Life From Stone Sauvignon Blanc, which is one of South Africa’s most celebrated Sauvignons. Personally, I find this level of greenness off-putting, but this is very much an individual taste issue. My preference is for wines with less of this character, such as Warwick Estate (Professor Black) or Vergelegen.

While Sauvignon Blanc has proved immensely popular with consumers, there has always been a feeling that it is a non-serious variety. You just don’t find many Sauvignons priced £15 and over, whereas for most other varieties, this sort of price ceiling doesn’t exist. For this reason, it’s exciting to see the work being done by Duncan Savage at Cape Point Vineyards. From this cool, maritime spot Duncan has for some years been making one of South Africa’s top Sauvignons. With some oak and a bit of Semillon in the blend, the Cape Point Isliedh is one of the world’s best expressions of Sauvignon, complex and precise and capable of ageing. This is the sort of wine that could see Sauvignon taken much more seriously by the fine wine community.

picture taken today on the coast road

Mike Ratcliffe
Warwick Estate & Vilafonte
P.O.Box 2 Elsenburg, 7607, South Africa

FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER www.twitter.com/mikeratcliffe