John Ford | WhaleTales Blog by Chris von Ulmenstein

Last night I attended the first Tracy van Maaren Wines Trade Tasting, representing a handful of select fine boutique wine estates, held at Auslese. Each of the wine estate’s wines offered for tasting was personally paired with a canapé designed by Chef Harald Bresselschmidt of Aubergine.

Tracy started her wine career by working as PA to Dana Buys at Vrede en Lust. She then moved into the clothing industry, but regretted this move. She returned to the wine industry, working at Jordan. Almost nine years ago she started her company, her first wine clients being Vriesenhof, Raats, and Catherine Marshall. She represents her clients’ wines in the ‘mid to top restaurants’ and independent retailers (e.g. Caroline’s, Wine Concepts, and Vino Pronto) in Cape Town and Stellenbosch, with Paarl and Franschhoek.

Auslese is a renovated house, available to rent for functions, about two blocks from Aubergine. It has a smallish kitchen, and the space was cleverly used to set up tasting tables for nine brands, with Pol Roger (Churchill’s favourite champagne) represented in the entrance hall by Great Domaines’ Derek Kilpin and their brand new French import Morgan Delacloche.

Arriving at about 18h30, there was no crush, and one could get to easily taste the wines and food pairings, chat to the wine representatives, and to the invited guests, which included John Maytham of Cape Talk, Mark Bland of Expresso, Mandi Jarman of Aquila, Chef Vanessa Marx and her colleague Rumby of Dear Me, Catharina’s Manager Ronel Smidt, sommelier and consultant Jörg Pfützner, John and Lynne Ford, and Mike Duggan of Wine Concepts. Continue reading →

I heard Richard Kershaw’s name for the first time when he was one of 80 Platter 5 star winners for his inaugural Kershaw Elgin Chardonnay 2012 earlier this month. Yesterday we attended a tasting of his 2012 Chardonnay and Syrah at Rodwell House in St James, at which Richard unpacked the importance of clones in making his two wines.

Richard is a larger-than-life personality, and wine judge and writer Angela Lloyd complimented him for his wines having personality too. He grew up in Sheffield, and did a cooking course in Slough, at an excellent chef’s school. He moved to winemaking, assisting in an American cellar, where he met a South African, who encouraged him to come to South Africa instead of to Chile and Argentina, where he intended to travel to next. He followed the advice of his friend, and fate determined that he met his now wife Mariette in the guest house in which he was staying in Stellenbosch, having arrived on the night on which Luciano Pavarotti gave his only South African concert, which they could hear from the guest house, he explained. He was shown around different cellars, but was most impressed with Mulderbosch, Laibach, and Vergelegen. He followed his dream to go to Chile to help make wine there, but his heart drew him back to Stellenbosch and to Mariette. He announced himself at Mulderbosch, boldly asking for a job, and his wish was granted. He does not have a formal winemaking qualification, but became a Master of Wine (MW) two years ago, after a six year study period, the first South African winemaker to have Continue reading →