Painted Wolf Lycaon Swartland Grenache 2015

A lovely rich mélange of sweet and crunchy red berry fruit, subtle pepper spice flavours, and aromas harmonized with sweet oak. This is an elegant wine with a gorgeous silky palate with a spicy finish.

This wine should be served slightly chilled with French country bistro cuisine such as warm sausage and potato salad, chicken braised with fennel, saffron and green olives or lamb chops with ratatouille and tapenade.

variety : Grenache [ 90% Grenache, 5% Shiraz, 5% Pinotage ]
winemaker : Jeremy Borg
wine of origin : Swartland
analysis : alc : 13.11 % vol  rs : 2.5 g/l  pH : 3.60  ta : 5.3 g/l  
type : Red  
pack : Bottle  size : 750ml  closure : Cork  

ageing : This wine should age gracefully and drink well for up to 10 years from vintage.

This wine’s name “Lycaon” comes from the scientific name for an African Wild Dog, Lycaon Pictus, and is derived from the Greek word Lycos for a wolf. This is an apt association for our Grenache, which is hand-made from organically certified grapes using traditional techniques. We have a wine that combines “sauvage”, elegance and energy in a spicy brooding finish.  The label illustration is derived from a page in an 18th century book on hunting in Southern Africa, which has been a major contributor to the demise of Wild Dogs. They are now our rarest big mammal and are steadily edging towards extinction.

in the vineyard : Grenache is from Kasteelsig vineyard, owned by Painted Wolf Pack member Billy (Guillermo) Hughes, and are organically certified grapes. Soil is red Glenrosa with some Oakleaf - shale rich duplex soils. The vineyards are not irrigated. Kasteelsig vineyard supplies grapes for some of South Africa’s top boutique wines. Yields are round 6 tons to the hectare.

about the harvest: The grapes were hand-picked.

in the cellar : The grapes were hand-picked into small baskets and taken to the cellar where they were destalked and gently crushed. The wine fermented in small open bins with four punch downs a day. When totally dry, we pressed into oak barrels to complete malolactic fermentation. The wine matured for 14 months in small French oak barrels of which, roughly 30% were new. This wine was finished off with a little Pinotage and Shiraz. 2400 bottles were produced.

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