in the vineyard : Planted between 1990 and 1993, the vineyards bearing the grapes used to craft this wine are grown on slopes facing west and north-west and in soils originating from decomposed granite and Table Mountain sandstone. The vines are all grafted onto nematode-resistant rootstocks of Richter 99, Richter 110 and Ruggeri 140 and are trellised on five-wire fence systems. When needed, the vines receive supplementary overhead irrigation to limit the amount of moisture-stress they are subjected to. The yield from the vineyard was restricted to an average of 6.3 tonnes per hectare to further enhance the quality of the fruit.
in the cellar : After destalking and crushing, the mash was fermented with a selected, pure yeast culture. After six days the juice has been removed from the skins. Fermentation temperatures averaged out at around 28 degrees Celsius.
Once the fermentation had been completed, the wine was drained off the primary lees and transferred to a “resting†tank. A brief settling period preceded the transfer of the wine into small, 225 litre oak barrels. A light egg-white fining had been used to “polish†the wine before it was bottled. The wine spent a total of 23 months in barrels of which the following were used: 35% new; 26% second-fill and 39% third-fill 72% French oak; 18% American oak and 10% Russian oak.