From left: Christo Pienaar, head of Veritas, with Diemersdal winemakers Reon Richter, Mari Branders, Janeke Beck and Juandré Bruwer.
Diemersdal Estate underscored the Durbanville Wine Valley’s ability to produce exceptional red wines at this year’s Veritas Wine Awards, winning three Double Gold medals – two for Pinotage and one for Syrah. All three wines are made from dryland vineyards grown on Diemersdal, one of Durbanville’s oldest wine farms with a history going back to 1698.
Diemersdal also won Veritas Gold medals for its Winter Ferment Sauvignon Blanc 2023 and the Diemersdal Malbec 2022.
Thys Louw, sixth generation proprietor and winemaker, says that despite the reputation Durbanville has developed for white wines, most noticeably Sauvignon Blanc, the region has a proud and long heritage of fine red wine production.
“The soils of decomposed granite and a cool maritime climate is obviously great for white wine, but red varieties also thrive in these conditions,” says Louw. “The history of Cape wine shows that superb Pinotage, Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon has originated from Durbanville and red varieties remain a very important part of the Diemersdal offering. And as these three Double Gold medals show, Durbanville red wines remain a vital part of Diemersdal’s quality proposition.”
The Journal Pinotage is made from vineyards planted in 1974 and as is the case with all Diemersdal vines, the plants are farmed without any irrigation so as to ensure maximum fruit-concentration and terroir-expression. The grapes are fermented in traditional open-top wooden fermenters with regular punch-downs to extract colour, tannin and flavour. Maturation is done for 22 months in new French oak barriques.
Diemersdal’s Double Gold-winning Syrah 2022 is the same wine that last year won the coveted Genl Smuts Trophy for best wine at the annual South African Young Wine Show and is the responsibility of winemaker Juandré Bruwer who works in the cellar with Thys and has a predilection for Syrah wines.
Juandré says he enjoys the challenge of making wine from this Rhône variety growing in the cool climate of Durbanville. “Diemersdal’s proximity to the Atlantic Ocean ensures cold winters and mild ripening conditions that give Syrah a unique character very different to the wines from warmer areas,” he says. “Syrah can be a bold, big wine. But in cooler regions one finds elegance and refinement allowing a flavour profile conducive to showing white pepper, dark-berries and plums, with an enticing presence of violet on the aroma. The fact that Diemersdal’s vines are unirrigated and sustained entirely by the natural climate cycles also plays a huge role in varietal expression.”
To add an extra dimension to the wine, Juandré uses whole-bunch fermentation to give freshness and vigour.
“The wine spent seven to nine days undergoing whole-bunch fermentation and was matured for 12 months in French oak barrels, of which 20% are new,” says Juandré. “Winning Double Gold at the country’s leading wine show is a great honour for our Syrah and Pinotage and will no doubt lead to more consumers discovering the greatness of Durbanville as a red wine region.”