Whilst wine has always been consumed as an alcoholic refreshment in a stemmed glass, more and more people want to experiment and refuse to believe that fancy stemware and formal tastings are the norm. By (respectfully) challenging the rituals that come with drinking South African wine – the opening of the bottle, the pouring of the wine, the swirling, the questions about what you get on the nose – one starts to wonder what could happen once we step beyond the glass. What will the outcome be if we’re brave enough to treat wine as something other than a beverage that belongs exclusively in a wine glass?
Globally, wine drinking habits and the landscape of wine have been changing rapidly over the last couple of years. According to the Wine International Association, there has been a clear shift toward “local alcohol levels, higher quality over quantity, and drinking with intention rather than habit.” It is also being said that while younger buyers tend to spend more per bottle, they buy less total volume and that they often explore lesser-known varieties and regions over well-known, expensive labels. Wine drinkers are becoming more and more experimental, with wine increasingly being seen as much more than just a drink. It’s an experience and something that needs to savoured, whether it’s paired with unexpected foods, part of a long-planned travel experience, or presented in a creative way by wine producers who are bold enough to look beyond the bottle in order to capture new audiences.
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With South Africa having such a wide variety of exceptional wines, perhaps a new chapter awaits. One in which it isn’t simply about how we drink wine, but rather about how creatively we can experience it.
Exploring the World of South African Wine Cocktails
Groot Phesantekraal’s winemaker, Richard Schroeder and Julian Short (aka The Flavourist) from Sin + Tax Bar have been shaking things up with a range of wine-inspired cocktails. The recent collaboration saw them experiment with all kinds of flavour profiles, ultimately resulting in an exclusive range of seriously delicious cocktails that feature most of the wine farm’s wines in less serious glasses.
For them, the experiment was a step in the direction of tapping into a market that does not know the wines, and ultimately making the wines (and the cocktails) accessible to experimental drinkers while staying true to the essence of Groot Phesantekraal’s wines.
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In a recent podcast episode with Schroeder and Short, they explained the process and the type of cocktails they created. Listen to the full episode here and see how you can enjoy wine, even in a cocktail:
Bringing Wine into the Kitchen
It’s difficult to prepare dinner without a glass of South African wine in hand. It adds to the experience of cooking, doesn’t it? But, cooking with wine – as an ingredient – is a whole other ball game. As Lauren Corona rightly states in an article on mashed.com: “Wine can elevate a dish, adding everything from zingy brightness to deep, rich, complex notes, depending on the wine you use and how you cook it.”
Most of us are familiar with wines in food – from risottos with creamy sauces that have been enriched even further with some white wine, to wine reductions and even sparkling wines in desserts. But, once you start digging, you’ll find many other exciting ways in which you can incorporate wine as ingredient while cooking. Think wine salt, wine glazes, wine syrups, or perhaps Michelin star-style wine snow. Some at-home chefs have even used sparkling wine in pasta sauces.
If you are an experimental cook, wine-washed cheeses could be something to add to your list of things to try. For those who like to bring heritage into their new-found cooking techniques, wine jellies or wine jams could also be a way of thinking beyond the glass, especially with Heritage Day around the corner.
Make It a Sundowner
Some people associate twilight with after-work cocktails. When the sun starts dipping, I see bubbles. It’s a signal to slow down and what better way to do it than with a glass of bubbly?
Whilst this is not something I typically do every day, it’s still a wonderful way to close off. Bring wine into the little moments and make ordinary days extraordinary. Whether it’s with golden-hour drinks, wine spritzers, a chilled rosé, a flute of Cap Classique, low alcohol pours, or a glass of wine with ice and botanicals – it’s your prerogative.
The Power of Place With South African Wine
There’s nothing like tasting a wine at its place of origin. And, in South Africa there are ample wine estates to choose from for vineyard lunches, cellar tours, wine and food pairings, farm stays, harvest experiences, wine festivals, wine and nature experiences and destination restaurants.
At Klein Constantia, for instance, you get taken up to a beautiful spot overlooking the Constantia Valley, where you can enjoy a wine tasting coupled with a beautiful platter filled with all kinds of delicious pairings.
Ultimately, wine tourism is not just about wine in a bottle. It’s about the experiences that come with it. The best wine memories often have very little to do with tasting notes. They are shaped during long lunches under old oak trees, conversations with expert winemakers and views across the winelands.
Make Wine Part of Your Tablescape
If you enjoy entertaining, bring wine into a space where it can be shared with friends and family. Create a relaxed wine experience at home and let the wines be part of the entertainment.
Choose three wines and pair them with simple South African bites like biltong, local cheese, olives, sourdough bread, seasonal fruit, charcuterie and koeksisters. Instead of the usual tasting notes and discussions around what you get on the nose, ask your guests which of the wines they would drink again, which food pairings surprised them the most and which wines remind them of a specific memory or place. This makes the wine pairing less intimidating and it’s a wonderful way for you and your guests to connect over things that matter.
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Another clever idea is to host an evening where everyone brings a bottle of a specific varietal – whether it be Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc, Pinot Noir, Cinsault or any other favourite. Cover the labels that no one knows what they’re drinking and then, when tasting the wines, guess the region or wine farms the wines are from. This makes for great fun and interesting conversations and could just as easily work as an ice breaker for a year-end event.
The Rules of Wine
I’ve come to realise that whilst wine is a sophisticated drink and it often tastes better in the right stemware, there are fewer rules to drinking wine than you might think. Enter an era of letting go and give way to some new thinking when it comes to wine drinking. You don’t always need the perfect glass, a formal tasting or an expensive bottle. You don’t always need a sommelier at the steer. And, you definitely don’t always need the ‘right occasion’ to enjoy a glass of wine. Instead, drink what you love and don’t be afraid to experiment a little. Pair your wines with something unexpected and don’t be afraid to try something new.
Perhaps the future of South African wine isn’t about changing the way we drink it, but rather about expanding the ways in which we experience it. Wine cocktails shared at sunset. A special bottle of wine discovered on holiday. Making your very first wine jelly or a wine reduction. Long lunches that stretch into late afternoons. These are the things that prove that wine has never really been about what’s in the bottle or in the glass. It’s what happens around it.
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