Beaumont Chenin shines in USA
Tuesday, 17 January, 2006
Beaumont Wines
In a November tasting of South African Chenin Blancs by the influential American magazine, Wine Enthusiast, Beaumont’s Hope Marguerite Chenin Blanc 2004 was selected as one of the top six wines in the wooded category.
Wine Enthusiast scored this wine a high 91 points out of 100, and commented that “this is a fine barrel-fermented Chenin that manages to retain elegant citrus and perfumed fruit flavours to balance the spice and fresh toast. A delicious, dry, food-friendly Chenin.”
Beaumont’s Hope Marguerite Chenin Blanc is named in honour of Hope, the greatly beloved mother and grandmother of the family.
Already recognised as a Chenin Blanc specialist, the Beaumont winery’s alternate Chenin Blanc 2004 also scored an outstanding 88 points in this recent Wine Enthusiast round-up, and is identified as a “benchmark” Chenin in the John Platter Guide.
The Chenin Blancs of the Cape are rapidly gaining international acclaim, since the best producers, like Beaumont, have older vines to create wines that are full of character and structure. This variety is steadily becoming an ambassador for South African wines as their uniqueness and quality becomes more widely known. Globally, Chenin is now our largest white wine export, with 32’9 million litres being sold in 2004 – up about 4 million litres on the previous year.
As the Wine Enthusiast review points out, the higher-quality Chenins come from specific areas of the Cape - and singles out the Overberg as one of these.
You can taste the award-winning Beaumont Chenin Blancs at the Bot River winery during the week from 09h30 to 12h30 and 13h30 to 16h30 and now also on Saturday mornings from 09h30 to 13h30.