#407 City on a Hill Red Blend 2020

Video chapter index

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00:00 – Intro
00:19 – Who is Andre Bruyns?
00:55 – What’s in the COAH Red Blend
01:20 – Context Detour: the BLIC technique for wine analysis
02:23 – What is a Swartland Red Blend?
03:19 – Tasting Notes for the City on a Hill Red Blend
04:41 – Questions about ageability of Syrah vs Grenache
05:18 – Video Links to deepen your knowledge

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What is a Swartland Red Blend?

It’s not a varietal. It’s not a global category. It’s a style that’s organically emerged from the terrain, climate, and ethos of the Swartland—and from the Swartland Revolution, which redefined how the world sees South African wine.
This med-Rhône-iberian fusion isn’t showing up in Bordeaux. Or Burgundy. Or Barossa. It’s ours. Which is why I’ve started calling it a “Swartland Red”—a term I think we need to normalize, possibly in the same way that a Cabernet Sauv, Cab Franc, Merlot blend is called a Bordeaux blend, even if the grapes are grown in Stellenbosch, California, Mendoza, or Margaret River.

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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 to be able to connect the info to the wine in the bottle. But until then, I’ve left you some tasting notes and technical specs.
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TASTING NOTES

TASTING NOTES
👃🏼It’s like a granite rockslide crushed a field of violets. Gravel dust clouds swirl with purple petals, a flicker of savoury leather, wild black pepper, and just enough prune and black plum to keep things grounded. Intense, but somehow still holding it together.

👄 Thre palate is laden with ripe, concentrated fruit that hits hard but never flabby. Like Chris Pratt in Jurassic World—still fun, but now with abs and a motorbike. Then the spice kicks in: serrated, precise, textbook Swartland pepper. A wave of vintage cedar follows, like your nana’s cabinet where the bone china lived. Tannins? Still firm, five years on—and this thing’s not done. Give it five more and see what happens.

TECHNICAL SPECS

🔬xx.
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