by Gareth Groves
I remember a young South African winemaker not long out of university swirling and sniffing a glass of Springfield Estate Wild Yeast Chardonnay and telling me that the way it was made contradicted everything he was told to do at school. “This is how not to make wine,” he told me “and I love it.”
The wine – made by brother and sister team Abrie and Jeanette Bruwer – is made using wild yeasts (you had probably guessed that) but where it really differs from other Chardonnays is that the Bruwers then do pretty much nothing but let nature take its course. The 2006 took 70 days to complete alcoholic fermentation and was then left to gradually meander through malolactic at its own pace.
In total it spent a whopping 13 months on the lees – in which time many other 2006 South African Chardonnays will have been made, aged in oak for a bit, bottled, sold and possibly even drunk. Even after those 13 months, Abrie and Jeanette held on to the wine and only released it when they deemed it ready to drink.
Patience is clearly a virtue at Springfield Estate.
The wine sees no new oak but this is hardly a fresh, fruit-forward number. That year and a bit on the lees adds a rich, buttery texture and a flavour that reminds me of ever-so-slightly cheesy posh creme fraiche poured over red apples and white peaches.
You might think that the fact the wine went through malolactic fermentation would leave it heavy and fat. Not so. There is a core of stony minerality and crisp acidity that the Bruwers attribute to the vine’s chalky soils and the cool Robertson nights. It often appears on my dining table at the same time as a pot roast chicken.
I love it too. It is so different to most of the wines I drink – and it revels in being different too. If this is how not to make wine, I wish more winemakers would throw away the rule book.
Tags: Chardonnay, south africa, Springfield, springfield estate, wine of the week
a yeast…
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