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When I first tasted the Alinea Carignan, (to my shame) I knew absolutely nothing about the winemaker, nor the wine. And yet the wine presented itself as a supremely classy act, making it an easy decision to add it to the HDS roster.

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A few weeks later, Alinea winemaker Natasha Jacka emerged as the Winemaker of the Year at the inuagural WineMag/Fedex NextGen TopTen awards, so it was obvious that the wine was classy because the winemaker was classy. But something still didn’t add up when I dug into the details of the wine. It was a Carignan from the Breedekloof – an undeniably warm valley – and yet the wine itself was enormously light and aromatic, while still showing detailed fruit development, and some pretty clear evidence of well-preserved rotundones…how could this be…? Even discounting Jacka’s clear skill in the cellar, who could have farmed carignan with the level of skill required to produce a wine like this?

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It should have come as no surprise that the answer to my question was: Elisme and Ferdie Visser from Olifantsberg. Not only is Elisme a superbly knowledgeable and diligent viticulturist, married to a painfully details oriented scientist, but they also far elevated vineyards that lie not on the Breedekloof valley floor, but up in the foothills of the mountainous valley edges, at altitudes between 200m and 400m ASL.

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The little vinifical sleuthing exercise was a wonderful reminder of what happens when like-minded viticulturists and winemakers are able to combine efforts towards the same end. Even though Elisme and Natasha are not formally connected to the same winery; and may never have even discussed their individual intentions concerning this little bloc of carignan, the fact that their creative ethos were aligned allowed a level of synergy that is sadly all too rare. The end result is a true delight.

If you have yet to sign up for your Monthly HanDrinksSolo Wine Subscription then you’ll have to hunt this wine down in your own time. But until then, here are my tasting notes and some technical specs:

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👃🏼 The vanguard is kinda like a Monica Potter sort-of-nose; delicate but memorable. You get these really pretty elements of light sweet spice (a touches of cloves and five spice powder), along with ripe strawberry fruit and red cherry candy.

👄 The palate has such a lovely vibrant juiciness to it. But this is not cherry juice by the pool. There is just soo much else going on. There is cherry fruit, and sweeter toffee apple notes, but the star of the show is the spice element; clean clear notes of cloves, five spice and madagascan pink peppercorn. On the finish, there are these really delicate tannins that tug ever so lightly, keeping your attention right to the finish.