Writing on the independant wine blog Grape, Tim James wine writer and judge, compiled with the help of other Cape Town wine professionals a list of South Africa’s top wineries.

The last time that such a poll was undertaken was in 2006. Reviewing the results Tim points out several aspects such as the fact that the top five wineries were in a league of their own; that ten of the Top 20 wineries were not even mentioned in the 2001 poll and that four wineries are complete newcomers to the poll.

From a perspective of production areas the winning wineries represent only one of the five South African wine regions, Coastal Region, and within that only the wine districts of Cape Point, Stellenbosch, Paarl and Swartland. The Overberg and Walker Bay districts where Paul Cluver, Hamilton-Russell Vineyards and Bouchard Finlayson are found do not fall into a particular region.

Parameters were set for the judging so that each winery had to have had at least three vintages of marketed wines.

In order of votes received the wineries are:

Boekenhoutskloof

Kanonkop and Sadie Family Wines which tied.

Cape Point Vineyards

Vergelegen

Hamilton-Russell Vineyards

Paul Cluver

Rustenberg

De Trafford, Meerlust and Thelema which tied

Bouchard Finlayson

Jordan and Tokara which tied.

Hartenberg

Le Riche, Neil Ellis and Steenberg which all tied.

Chamonix and Morgenster which tied.

On the voting panel were wine writers Tim Atkin, Michael Fridjhon, Joanne Gibson, Edo Heyns, Tim James, Angela Lloyd, Melvyn Minnaar, Fiona McDonald, Christine Rudman, Cathy van Zyl, Philip van Zyl.

Retailers: Carrie Adams, Carolyn Barton, Ingrid Motteux, Roland Peens, James Pietersen, Caroline Rillema

Sommeliers and others who took part were Miguel Chan, Neil Grant, Higgo Jacobs, Cathy Marston, Andre Morgenthal, Joerg Pfuetzner, Kent Scheermeyer and Jonathan Steyn.

For the complete article visit www.grape.co.za