2022 Not Tonight Josephine

I dropped in to see winemaker Duncan Savage at his Cape Town winery, where he proudly showed me the top floor above the winery that he recently managed to acquire, freeing up a lot more space. “It was quite warm as a vintage,” he tells me. “The 2022s were picked at similar levels to normal, but there was more selection and sorting. We picked 11 tons between 40 people, and 12 people had to carefully sort because of bird damage. The acids are slightly lower than normal. We meddle only where we need to meddle. Chenin Blanc can get rich and flabby, and we have to manage that. So, barrels are stored at around 10° Celsius rather than 16° Celsius in order to keep the whites as tight as possible.” This was a brilliant set of distinctive wines from Savage, crowned by a stunning Touriga Naçional/Syrah blend under the “Are We There Yet?” moniker. The Savage Red, which utilises 40% whole clusters, is one of the best released yet, and I feel it's superior to the white counterpart this year.