Palate
Flavours of new leather and damp earth with a touch of vanillan oak.
Growing Conditions
After good early winter rains, the rainfall eased off to become drier in the later half. A warmer than average spring into November. Rain returned in December, which ended up being cooler on average than November, an unusual occurrence to say the least. The weather returned to normal during the Christmas period until the second week of January where we got a deluge of rain over 3 days around 100mls. Way over the monthly average of 14.5mls. This had an immediate effect of recharging the sub-soils and the Cabernet kept green leaves till late into the season, these leaves working meant for higher sugar levels and higher acidities. There was more rain late in February, but had little effect on the quality. More rain arrived on 27th March, but by that time the Cabernet was safely in the winery.
Bottling
Nov-17.
Winemaking
The grapes were handpicked, then immediately destemmed and crushed. During fermentation the temperature is allowed to reach 29degrees. The time on the skins is around 25 days before pressing and racked into second use french barrels.This is the second release of the Estate Cabernet Sauvignon in this style where the inspiration came from a vintage spent in Bordeaux in 2014. The techniques used in making this wine are not used in any of our other reds. Destemming and fully crushed berries, inert gases in the ferment tanks prior to filling. Two different yeasts inoculated sequentially,warmer ferments, sequential pressing straight to barrel after a moderately long fermentation period of 25 days and barrel to barrel racking.
