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Nederburg achieves five-star Platter ranking first time ever
Nederburg has won its first five-star rating for a wine featured in the 2009 edition of the Platter South African Wine Guide. The accolade, for the maiden 2007 vintage of Ingenuity White, a connoisseur eight-way white blend positioned at the apex of the winery’s multi-tiered range, marks a renewed respect for the winery as a producer of serious offerings with specialist appeal.
The achievement is a culmination of a very successful year in which Nederburg took top honours on the 2008 Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show and produced the winning Shiraz in this year’s Lexus WINE Shiraz Challenge. It was also the only South African producer to win gold on the 2008 International Sweet Wine Challenge in Australia and earned the biggest cache of Grand d’Or medals on this year’s Michelangelo International Wine Awards.
On the International Wine & Spirits Competition in London, Nederburg won top marks for six of its wines and locally, it earned a total of 29 Veritas medals, the highest number on the show.
Says cellarmaster Razvan Macici of the five-star achievement: “This is a very proud moment and an accomplishment we have always sought to attain. Platter’s most coveted ranking has eluded Nederburg until now, despite our status as South Africa’s most awarded winery, a reputation established well before my time.
“We are to some extent the victim of our own success. As the country’s most popular premier label,
Nederburg is enjoyed by rank and file South Africans, who can select from the various tiers to suit their palates and pockets. However, our ubiquity and accessibility have resulted in a perception in some quarters, that we are not necessarily a brand that deserves to be taken all that seriously.
“Consequently, while the winery has been earning top scores on shows locally and abroad, it hasn’t been given much critical attention. That is starting to change, particularly since the launch last year of our micro-cuvée, ultra-premium tiers, Ingenuity and Manor House.
“The connoisseur appeal of these collections has encouraged some critics to explore the entire range and rediscover our more popular offerings as well. This is very gratifying to us because we apply the same meticulous attention to detail across the full portfolio, from everyday to collector wines.”
He describes the 2007 Nederburg Ingenuity White as big and bold and an expression of the winery at its most innovative. “It is led by Sauvignon blanc (40%) sourced from Groenekloof and Durbanville, offering herbaceous aromas and crisp, minerally, green flavours. Its next biggest components are Chardonnay (20%) and Viognier (15%) both from Durbanville, followed by super-ripe bush-vine Chenin blanc (10%) from Darling. A small portion of the Sauvignon blanc was fermented in French oak, while the Chardonnay was fermented and aged in new French 228-litre barrels. The balance comprises Semillon (6%), Rhine Riesling (3%), wood-aged Nouvelle (3%) and wood-aged Verdelho (3%).
Macici says he and colleague Tariro Masayiti are currently developing the blend of the 2008 vintage, due to be released early in 2009.
DATE: NOVEMBER 13, 2008
ISSUED BY: DKC (DE KOCK COMMUNICATIONS)
FOR: NEDERBURG WINES
QUERIES: RUDOLPH DU TOIT, NEDERBURG MARKETING MANAGER (021) 809 7000, 082 550 4145
DÈ-MARI PRETORIUS, NEDERBURG BRAND MANAGER (021) 809 7000 or 082 695 5997
TESSA DE KOCK/MARLISE POTGIETER, DKC (021) 422 2690
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