WHOA! Better than R60 a bottle for this award winner from Van Loveren in the Robertson winelands, R49pb is all that’s being asked for the 2021 Tangled Tree Butterscotch Chardonnay from the Ultra Value Wine Challenge organisers, BuyBetterWine.com. And Woah! The White Wine of the Year at the 2022 competition (for wines selling at under R130 per 750ml) is also available in a 3L pack at R165 from the cellar door, BUT at just R135 from the Pick n Pay supermarket chain! That’s around R34 per 750ml, and the bigger pack is a box, which some may prefer to a bottle in this instance, the 750ml being a ‘squishy’ PET (aka plastic) bottle.

Tangled Tree? A love story of sorts, about an avid gardener and her husband, and two trees planted side by side, hugging and clinging to each other as they grew up on the Retiefs’ family farm.

The wine’s recommended by a panel comprising Cape Wine Master Ginette de Fleuriot, Master of Wine and Elgin winemaker Richard Kershaw, sommelier Spencer Fondaumiere and the cellarmaster at Warwick in Stellenbosch, JD Pretorious. Rated ‘blind’. Deep golden colour. Opinions welcome.