The Wine tour

I love wine. I love it like I love Cricket.

Just like cricket, my interaction with it consists of reading about it than actually experiencing it. 

I may not be able to bowl a wicked bouncer or smash a ball for six, but by golly – I can sure talk about it. I can talk about with knowledge and passion and emotion and ....well, I can talk a lot about it, but haven’t touched a bat or ball for ages.

Similarly, I have read a lot about wine – I have read stories based on wine, loved characters who talk about wine, realised that the simplest way to show that a character is upper class and erudite is to show him having a deep knowledge of wine. I read about types of wine – cabernet sauvignon, and merlot and pinot noir and all that, and can talk glibly about tannins and grape varieties and how ironic it is that the famous Shiraz grape comes from a town in Iraq where it is probably illegal to make, drink or even think about wine, etc etc.

But actually drinking the stuff – not so much. 

I experimented as much as I could afford with various types of wines – but that was  a short lived experiment during my forced bachelorhood.

After the return of She-who-must-be-obeyed  my home wine drinking came to a screeching halt under her incandescent eye.  Trying to get friends to drink wine resulted only in incredulous looks.  Trying to make friends with people who were already wine drinkers got me even more incredulous looks.

She-who-must-be-obeyed sneered at my attempts to drink wine and grandly announced that she was sending me on a wine tour in South Africa.

 ‘Go and drink wine, you drunken sot.’ She said as she booked the tour ‘lower yourself to the level of the beasts in the field if you wish.’

‘What nonsense.’ I said, stung. ‘I will have you know that wine is a thing of great culture.’

‘The only way you will have culture in you is when you eat some yoghurt re!’ she retorted.

‘Anyway, the tiny tot has exams till then, so I can’t move anywhere – so you go a couple of days earlier and do all these things that I am not interested in.’

OK, I thought – it’s a good idea to keep her away from wine makers. She will sneer at them so much that they will get all dispirited and depressed and commit suicide or something and the whole of South African wine industry will be affected and it will be all my fault.

The thing about wine is that it is a beautiful and nuanced drink, and it is such fun to write about.

‘This wine has a deep straw colour with hints of lime green on the rim. The nose is a complex melange of tropical fruits, such as guava and papayas with greener Sauvignon blanc aromas such as asparagus and lemon grass. The flavours are rich and full and mirror the aromas on the nose. This wine is mouth filling with an apple texture, a slight grip on the finish and a lingering crisp aftertaste.’

‘She’ read this with a scowl  ‘Saala – is this wine or a fruit cocktail?’

This one is even better, I said – showing her the description of the Chardonnay   ‘There is an abundance of fresh fruit aromas on the nose; ripe honeydew melon, pineapple, peach and citrus fruit with a hint of toasted oak. The palate is fresh and fruit driven with a creamy mild palate, a hint of toast on the finish with a long zesty aftertaste.’

Would the writer be so passionate when writing about the actual fruit instead of the wine? I wondered.

This same writer must be the guy whom all the Indian restaurants employ when writing their fancy menus. A guy who can translate dal chaawal into ‘A delectable preparation of the finest golden lentils from central India, mixed with the aromatic  jasmine-white fluffy long grains of the finest rice from Kerala topped with shiny salt crystals from the romantic lands of Kutch.’

So the big day arrived -  and the very first day in south Africa, I was picked up at the hostel by a sweet lady who was our guide. I was the first person she picked up, and she went about the town picking up the rest of the group – an Indo-Canadian, A Scotswoman, a couple of guys from Ivory coast, a bunch of expat students from Cape university.

She started by taking us through the cellar and the factory and telling us how wine is made, but very soon took us to a table and started plying us with wine.We started off with a couple of Champagnes, then some white wines, then some red wines and then ended with some sweet wines.

‘This is a cabernet sauvignon’ she would say, pouring a little bit of wine into each glass . ‘It is a very young wine, bottled in 2013 and has top notes of jasmine, peach and whatever’  and we would all drink and say ‘hmm hmm’ and swirl the wine in our mouth and get amazed at the wonderful taste.

 It sounds like a load of cock when you hear about it – but you can actually get the various tastes that they are talking about. And when you think that these differing tastes were brought about without any external agents – purely through the fermentation of grapes – it’s bloody amazing! You have to try it to get it..

 To quote from the movie ‘Sideways’ – ‘I like to think about the life of wine...how it’s like a living thing. I like to think about what was going on the year the grapes were growing; how the sun was shining; if it rained. I like to think about all the people who tended and picked the grapes. And if it’s an old wine, how many of them must be dead by now. I like how wine continues to evolve, like if I opened a bottle of wine today it would taste different than if I’d opened it on any other day, because a bottle of wine is actually alive. And it’s constantly evolving and gaining complexity...and it tastes so fucking good!’

I could actually feel the difference between each wine and appreciate the qualities of different types of wine.

At first.

After the third winery, they were all tasting the same to me and we were all going HAHAHAHA and HOHOHOHOHO and slapping each other on the back. The ancient romans used to say ‘In Vino Veritas’ – In wine there is truth, but we can also say – ‘In Vino Companis’ – where there is wine, there is good companionship.

 The wine was excellent, the wineries were beautiful, the scenery of the wine country was simply outstanding, and the group was very friendly  - what more can one ask for?  We had a fantastic lunch at a winery– I had a Cape malay dish called ‘Bobotie’ – which was a sweet and spicy mince meat dish which was absolutely smashing.

At the last winery, there was also a cheese tasting, where we pigged out on different kinds of cheese -  from the fresh Feta cheese at one end ( which tasted like a very salty paneer) to an old blue cheese at the other end (which smelt and tasted like disgusting old socks) but had some truly delicious ones in the middle – one sweet fruity one which tasted as good as cheesecake and a couple of spicy ones which were simply yum.

At the end of it, she dropped us back at our hostels – and as I was the first to be picked up, I was the last to be dropped off. I didn't mind it at all as it gave me a chance to see Cape Town.

As she dropped me off, she called out to me and I put my hand in my pocked as I thought she was asking for a tip...

but it turned out to be quite the reverse!

‘As a reward for your patience, I would like to give you a present’ she said, and handed me a bottle of wine. ‘Please enjoy this with your family.’

I was speechless, and quite touched. What a lovely gesture.

‘Thanks.’ I said ‘Thanks a lot’  

And I truly meant it.