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Category: 2024

A rather rare, very unusual wine… Springfontein Chenel

AT SPRINGFONTEIN, outside the town of Stanford, the focus is on the South African grape varieties Pinotage and Chenel, albeit that the latter’s arrival on the farm was quite recent relative to when the first wine was bottled on the farm in 2004. “We wanted to showcase something indigenous, something

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Wild Horseshoe 2023! Top-rated white wine in Platter’s Guide

THE MOST highly rated Sauvignon Blanc, the most highly rated white wine and one of the three most highly rated wines overall in the 2025 edition of Platter’s South African Wine Guide: the 2023 vintage of Diemersdal Wild Horseshoe, WO Durbanville. This after 5 Star ratings in the guide for

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Saronsberg Shiraz 2022! Top-rated red wine in Platter’s Guide

THE VAN HUYSSTEEN family’s Saronsberg Cellar is renowned for a number of different wines, but Shiraz is the speciality on this farm in the Tulbagh district east of the Swartland, north of Wellington and the Breedekloof. They’ve been at it for a couple of decades and are consistently Classified among

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Christine 2017! Top-rated red blend in Platter’s 2025 Guide

MANY if not most of South Africa’s top red wines released in 2024 are from the 2021 or 2022 vintages – two- or three-year-old wines. Very few of the country’s producers routinely offer wines that are older than five years old. Whereas Buitenverwachting of Constantia hold back their flagship red

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Constantia Glen’s white blend on the mark time and again

WHAT A LOVELY place to relax at on a summer’s day with a chilled glass of something good and interesting… We’re talking Constantia Glen and their No. 2 blend. Again and again, Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon have combined in delightful fashion under the label of ‘Constantia Glen Two’. For over

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And then there were more seriously good wines at < R150

5 STARS in Platter’s 2025 SA Wine Guide, from one of the country’s top winemakers in Donovan Rall, using grapes grown on the mountains in the back of beyond, priced at under R150pb and not yet sold out… Not even released yet! The WinterHoek Sauvignon Blanc 2023 from Callender Peak

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Top 3 in Platter’s 2025 Guide from Elgin, Durbanville, Tulbagh

THE TOP-RATED wines in the 2025 edition of Platter’s South African Wine Guide – scored 98/100 – are the Cap Classique sparkler Cipher Blanc de Noirs 2018 from the Elgin cellar of Charles Fox, the Wild Horseshoe Sauvignon Blanc 2023 from Diemersdal in Durbanville and the 2022 Shiraz from Saronsberg,

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