Pinotage, South Africa’s unique flagship grape, has just celebrated its 100th birthday. Not a bad milestone for a curious, controversial cross between pinot noir and cinsault, bred by the viticulturist Abraham Izak Perold in Stellenbosch, that took almost 40 years before it popped up on labels.
Today pinotage is a welcome and much-improved variety that makes everything from simple, fruity, red and black cherry swiggers through to black as night, complex, scented, figgy, woodsmoke stars. Yet in the early Noughties pinotage, due to dodgy viti and viniculture practices, was roundly trashed by me and others as nowt but a burnt rubber and acetone-tainted horror. Thankfully, grubbing up virused vineyards, scrubbing dirty cellars and chucking out old, malodorous oak helped to clean up pinotage’s act and reputation. As did lowering yields and fermentation temperatures, steering clear of reductive, oxygen-free winemaking, plus picking riper grapes.
Weirdly, good pinotage has little in common with its pale pinot noir and light cinsault parents, and tastes nothing like them. For starters, its dark, dusky hue, care of small, thick-skinned grapes, leads onto reds with decent amounts of tannin and acidity, plus loads of body, fruit and alcohol. The final trick to producing good pinotage, now the country’s third most widely planted red grape, is to find a warm site — Stellenbosch, Swartland and Paarl all come up trumps — and to avoid extreme temperatures and water stress at harvest time. Not easy in a hot, arid country like South Africa.
A little pinotage goes a long way, hence most Cape red blends contain about a third of the variety. If you want more pinotage in the mix, the bottle to buy is The Society’s 2024 Pinotage-Syrah (thewinesociety.com, £9.95); it’s a fine, bold, beefy, smoky, black fruited swig, made from two thirds old bush vine pinotage, with the remainder syrah.
One wheeze that not everyone will enjoy is coffee pinotage, made by fermenting the wine on mocha-scented toasted oak chips, or staves. Aldi’s lush, earthy, espresso coffee-edged 2024 Cambalala South African Macchiato Pinotage (aldi.co.uk, £7.99) is as good as any. Far better though to splash out on the vibrant, red and black plum-spiced 2023 Simonsberg Pick of the Bunch Pinotage (handford.net, £14.99) — it’s a 14 per cent Stellenbosch gem. Southern Right, from the Hamilton-Russell stable in the pretty Hemel-en-Aarde Valley of the Western Cape, is another pinotage of note, with the 2020 a vibrant, less tub-thumping mouthful, with fine blackberry and biltong fruit (noblegreenwines.co.uk, £24.90).
From left: Deluxe, The Society’s Exhibition, Rijk’s Touch, Kanonkop
Pinotage stars
2022 Deluxe Pinotage
14 per cent, Lidl, £6.49
Lidl’s Fairtrade-approved dusky, dark berry and cherry-rich Deluxe pinotage makes a tasty rustic mouthful.
2021 The Society’s Exhibition Pinotage
14 per cent, thewinesociety.com, £12.50
Punching well above its weight, this velvety, chocolate-scented pinotage overflows with black fig fruit.
2020 Rijk’s Touch Pinotage
14.5 per cent, privatecellar.co.uk, £20
An absolutely delicious, firm, meaty coffee bean-scented pinotage from a boutique winery in Tulbagh.
2021 Kanonkop Pinotage
14.5 per cent, Majestic Wine, £34.99
A great estate’s dreamy, old vine, French oak-aged pinotage, with complex, rich, savoury, tobacco leaf charm.
Integro Verdeca, Castellore Organic Pinot Grigio, Bird in Hand Sparkling Rosé, Tukituki Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc
This week’s best supermarket buys
2023 Integro Verdeca, Puglia, Italy
12.5 per cent, Booths, £9, down from £10.50
A zesty, organic white, made from hot, sunny Puglia’s rare verdeca grape, with masses of lime peel pizzazz.
2022 Castellore Organic Pinot Grigio delle Venezie
Italy, 12 per cent, Aldi, £6.99
Enhanced by a 15 per cent dollop of other grapes, this floral, sweetly fruited organic 2022 gets my vote.
2024 Bird in Hand Sparkling Rosé, South Australia
12.5 per cent, Waitrose, £11.99, down from £15.99
A tank method, cherry blossom-pale, rose petal-scented, pinot noir-dominant sparkler, enriched with chardonnay and shiraz.
2023 Tukituki Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc, New Zealand
12 per cent, Asda, £8.06
A greeny-gold, herbaceous, fruity Kiwi pumped up mostly with chardonnay, grüner veltliner and pinot noir.