Melvyn Minnaar Moveable feast
The label on the outside is the thing. That, all shoppers know and only naive socialists will contradict. But it is sadly ironic that the once ber Bro of our wine industry – who should have kept the flag flying in all circumstances – have such little faith in what is inside the bottle.
Whatever the captivating cloak-and-dagger details still to be uncovered in the KWV Champagne scam (Mail & Guardian, June 6 to 12), the fact is that the mastermind behind “Project Spark” had the audacious self- assurance to believe that hundreds of people – all over the world, possibly – wouldn’t know real champagne from his fake stuff.
Well, all though one doesn’t know how much faux champers from South Africa was consumed in this instance, our Mousseux mind has a point. Without being too pedantic about it, one can say that a lot of Mo?t et Chandon is drunk without the gullible gulpers knowing what’s in their glasses.
Take this champagne grand marque’s premier brand – the coveted grand daddy of them all – Dom P?rignon. A magnum of this bubbly, the ultimate show-off, together with one’s diamond-encrusted Rolex and a parked Porsche – sells for a cool R1 100 at Picardi bottle stores.
How many people who get to drink this stuff know what they are drinking? (Picture one of those New Year Eve bacchanals at Sol’s, where pretty young things shower in the stuff.)
As the largest champagne house in the world – with some four million bottles being shipped world-wide each year – Mo?t et Chandon champagne is de rigueur at any celebration worth its while. It’s a sitting duck for a scam among the plebs.
But while the story of the millions of fake M et C labels discovered in the vicinity of Paarl has not yet been told, the taste of “Charles Lemond champagne” (like “Paul Lambert”, one of Operation Spark’s original creations) has been put to the test.
An adventurous bubbly boffin bought some of the stuff when it was loaded on to the public by Customs at the time (the intrigue of the bottles’ Atlantic crossings is pure farce) and a formal tasting was set up. It didn’t even make a second round of comments.
The tasters turned their attention to better and more spunky stuff: South Africa’s own sparkling wine made in the style of champagne. Local M?thode Cap Classique wines have been the challenge de luxe for our wine-makers and they come up trumps many times.
There is Johan Malan, whose spectacular Simonsig Kaapse Vonkel has won many international awards, including the prestige International Wine Challenge in London. The 1993 is now on the market and is deeply delicious!
Then there is Pieter Ferreira at Graham Beck’s Madeba winery. His sparkling wines have been exceptionally brilliant – and good value for money.
At the important Cape Independent Winemakers Guild auction on September 27, his is the only sparkling wine on offer: a Graham Beck Brut Zero Blanc de Blanc 1991 – a bright, full bubbly made from chardonnay only, that has matured on the lees to complex perfection for many years. The name of this label tells it like it is. And it’s what’s inside that really matters …
Call Barbara Pienaar on (021) 883-8625 for details about the Cape Independent Winemakers Guild Auction
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