The Mentors Petit Verdot 2020

This intense, ruby-red wine is concentrated and leads on the nose with perfume notas, red berries, cranberries and sweet spice followed by black olives and aniseed. The palate is rich and juicy with plums and dark cherries. The grippy tannin structure is well integrated and delivers an intense, lasting finish.

Rich and juicy, the wine is best paired with hearty red meats and aged cheese.

variety : Petit Verdot [ 100% Petit Verdot ]

winery : The Mentors

winemaker : The Winemaking Team

wine of origin : Stellenbosch

analysis : alc : 14.63 % vol rs : 3.4 g/l pH : 3.55 ta : 6.1 g/l

type : Red style : Dry body : Full taste : Fragrant wooded

pack : Bottle size : 750ml closure : Cork

AWARDS

2024 Mundus Vini - Gold
2024 Concours Mondial de Bruxelles - Silver
2023 Lumo Awards - Gold
2023 Trophy Wine Show - Bronze

ageing :

This wine is ready to be enjoyed now, but will cellar well for at least eight years.

The 2020 vintage was characterized by generally favourable conditions, improved winter rainfall preceding the growing season and generally mild conditions. This resulted in improved crops in particular in the coastal areas or Swartland, Wellington, Paarl and Stellenbosch. The vintage period was lower in disease pressure than the 2019 vintage but some rainfall during vintage did require careful management. The spring period was unusually warm prompting early bud break and accelerated early growth while, the summer through vintage was mild in terms of temperature with fewer peaks or periods of high temperature. This resulted in an early vintage start and a compressed February finishing earlier than in recent years. Wines show great retention of freshness and flavour with good tannin development and aging potential. We are hugely excited about the quality of the 2020 Vintage.

in the vineyard :

The 2019 season showed great promise with improved winter rains. However, variable weather conditions, with continuous temperature fluctuations, resulted in inconsistent bud break, uneven flowering and set. Followed by slow and uneven ripening. Reds were most affected and overall yields were down. White varieties, except for the lower yields on Sauvignon Blanc, were as expected. The challenges are not without rewards: whites are bright and flavourful with good aromatics. Reds have soft tannins with rich fruit and generosity.

about the harvest: Grapes were harvested optimally ripe and hand-sorted in the cellar to ensure only the best fruit is used for fermentation.

in the cellar :

After two days of cold maceration the juice was inoculated with a selected yeast strain. Alcoholic fermentation lasted approximately six days and during this time was pumped over every five hours. Wine was racked off the skins, settled and transferred to barrels where malolactic fermentation took place for three weeks. The wine was then racked and cleaned, and returned to barrels. After 12 months, the best wines were selected to mature for an additional six months. In total during the 18-month maturation period the wine was racked twice. This wine is truly about selecting the best-of-the-best. The wine was matured for 18 months in French oak barrels of which 70% was first-fill.

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