The Drift Farm Moveable Feast 2017

The Drift Farm Moveable Feast

The nose of The Drift Farm Moveable Feast shows a beguiling mixture of ripe mulberry, white pepper, buchu (a medicinal herb from the Cape Floral Kingdom, used as a blackcurrant flavouring), framed in a touch of toasty, vanilla oak and just the faintest hint of minty caramel chocolate. The palate echos the blackcurrant, mulberry and dark cherry. The tannins are super smooth, long and persistent. This wine benefits from being decanted a day or two before consuming. It will age gracefully for at least 30 years if stored correctly

Driven by a desire to make individual, superb quality wines with exceptional character The Drift wines are assiduously crafted by winemaker Bruce Jack using only the grapes grown on the farm. The Drift specializes in four wines - a single vineyard Rosé, a single vineyard Pinot Noir, a single vineyard Barbera and a blended red wine from various varieties and vineyard sites on the farm. Chief Winemaker and Farmer Bruce Jack grew up in Cape Town, the son of an architect and a musician/writer, so perhaps it was inevitable he would become a winemaker. The Drift is a founding member of the Premium Independent Wineries of South Africa (PIWOSA), a collective of small yield winemakers working together to promote their hand crafted vintages to International markets.

This fiesty red is called Moveable Feast because the blend will alter slightly every year depending on what's in the barrels and how they perform - a blend of Malbec and Shiraz with Tannat, Touriga Nacional and Pinot Noir carefully blended in to spice it up.

This is an estate blend using only grapes grown on this unique Overberg Highland's farm. As such it reflects the different aspects and soils on this remarkable farm. Each variety has been paired with a specific soil type and slope. All vineyards lie between 390m and 550m above sea level. Because the vineyards face in various directions, with various row directions, they have been able to embrace the complexity of the farm, and so transfer that soul into the wine.

Each variety is treated differently. Most are fermented apart, but as pioneers of co-fermentation in South Africa they do have a few secret combinations of co-fermenting varieties. Generally the wines are fermented in open top fermentors with between 15% and 50% whole bunches. The tanks are small vessels and are hand plunged 5 or 6 times a day. Fermented wild, this can take some time. Aged in 225 litre barrels, mostly old, for 18 months.

Only around 4800 bottles are made each year and the labels are made of handmade Japanese paper that Bruce gets made locally.

http://thedrift.co.za/wine/

The Drift Farm Moveable Feast - Hay Wines