IT BEGGARS belief on hearing that a red wine from one of the main drags on South Africa’s Paarl wine route can be judged good enough to win a gold medal yet sell for just R48 per bottle at the cellar door on the farm. Believe it. Landskroon pulled it off as a laureate at the 2018 Cab Franc Challenge!

The wine: Landskroon Paul Hugo Red, 2016 vintage. It’s a blend of Cabernet Franc (50%), Shiraz (30%) and Merlot (20%). Tank-maturation involved a combination of American and French oak staves, with a small portion of the wine aged in French oak barrels before the blend was bottled in October 2017. Alc 14%, R/S 3.0, TA 5.6, pH 3.44.

The winemakers describe their combo as: “A complex concentration of fruit… An easy quaffer for fun times… Refreshing if chilled in summer… Good accompaniment to cheese, light barbeque meals and spicy seafood.” And we’d recommend decanting it an hour or two before serving.

The Landskroon Wine Estate has belonged to the De Villiers family for five generations. Proprietor Paul de Villiers has this to say about the wine named after him and his brother: “The Paul Hugo Red was the first screw-cap red from Landskroon. We wanted to produce a red that was easy-drinking, and therefore used some Cabernet Franc, which normally matures faster and is lighter in style than its big brother Cabernet Sauvignon.”