Painted Wolf Den Pinotage 2024
Bright rhubarb, cranberry and red plum notes on the nose. Flavor-packed, this wine offers up ripe berry fruit with hints of milk chocolate and toasty wood. Palate is medium weight and stays light on its feet, while presenting moderate complexity and structure. Designed for casual consumption and perfectly suited to pair with BBQ’s, pizza and bar food, like hamburgers.
The history of Pinotage always makes for a fascinating story. Like Zinfandel in the US, in the right hands, Pinotage can produce absolutely world class wines. Warmer vintages have a tendency to lean toward the Rhone in style – thanks to the Cinsault parent in the cross. Cooler vintages lean a little more toward Burgundy – as a result of the Pinot Noir parent in the cross. It is an interesting side note, that Painted Wolf winemaker Jeremy Borg, learned his winemaking skills at Rosenblum Cellars in California, making Zinfandel and he continues to apply this same level of expertise and TLC to his love of Pinotage, albeit that mature years have tempered his enthusiasm for the excessive alcohols he experienced in California back then. Painted Wolf make 4 different Pinotage wines, with “The Den” wines as more approachable social wine styles, to be enjoyed with friends and family – named for the den, the heart of all African wild dog communities. Jenny Metelerkamp, who lived with the Borgs in the bush in Botswana, produced a fine painted wolf ink drawing, which is on the front label.
Grapes for this wine were harvested from Knollefontain farm in the Voor Perdeberg region of Paarl, and from Leeuwenkuil farm in the Swartland. Harvest lasted from the end of January thru the first half of February. The Knollefontain vineyard is the largest Pinotage vineyard in the world being more than 100 acres of ground hugging unirrigated bush vines. The vines face north and are exposed to a lot of sunshine and light. Once in the cellar the grapes were destemmed and fermented in tanks with a combination of French and American oak staves. After an initial cold soaking for 4-6 days, the grapes were allowed to warm up and for spontaneous fermentation to take place. Fermentation temperatures are controlled carefully to ensure that virtually none of the banana esters for with Pinotage is sometimes known, are found in the wine. Malolactic fermentation occurred on skins and took place in these same tanks. To broaden the flavor of the wine and to make it a little more savory, 12% Shiraz was added to the blend.
