31 May 2020

WoTM - Del-Gatto Estates Odyssey 2016

My Wine of The Month for May is Del-Gatto Estates ‘Odyssey’ Pinotage 2016, Prince Edward County VQA

At the end of October 2017 I drove 2+ hours west from Toronto, Ontario, to Prince Edward Island. The island is close to and connected to the mainland by a bridge. On the south of the island is Del Gatto Estate, the reason for my visit, which I detailed here.


Pat Del Gatto has planted Pinotage and makes an excellent wine from it that had sold out. But Pat had some of the young 2016 in his library which he let me taste and buy a bottle which I BYO’d  in November with a fine steak at  the Double Cut Steakhouse, Kalahari Resort in Poconos, Pennsylvania where I was attending the American Wine Society Conference. 

Pat posted me another bottle which I saved at home and opened this month.



A delicious perfume was released as the cork was raised. The wine was a bright clear dark red and tasted of clean ripe berry fruits, cherry and strawberry. I didn’t note any chocolate flavours this time. The fruit on the front palate lingered long on the lasting aftertaste. The wine was fine drinking now, but there was no hurry as this fine wine will last.



29 May 2020

AWEsome Pinotages

Two Pinotages make the 100 AWEsome wines list chosen by the Association of Wine Educators (AWE).

They are

The Society's Exhibition Pinotage 2017
David & Nadia Siebritskloof Pinotage 2017


The first is Kanonkop's Kadette Pinotage labeled for and sold by The Wine Society in the UK.

The full list is here

25 May 2020

Meerendal Pinotage Tasting Video

Meerendal's Bennie Howard CWM tastes and talks about Meerendal's basic and old vine 'Heritage Block' Pinotages

22 May 2020

The fall and rise of Pinotage

There's a thoughtful article considering   The fall and rise of Pinotage by Rupert Millar at  hudin.com in which he says

Pinotage is a grape capable of a broad spectrum of styles from deeper, darker, almost marshmallow pillowy wines to very light, succulent examples flaunting that Pinot DNA and terroir expression to boot.