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AA Badenhorst - Swartland, South Africa

Secateurs Riviera 2021

£19.00
Availability: Translation missing: en.general.icons.icon_check_circle icon

COLOUR: ORANGE

GRAPE: CHENIN BLANC

COUNTRY: SOUTH AFRICA

REGION: SWARTLAND

BOTTLE SIZE: 75CL

THE WINEMAKER: AA BADENHORST

As far as we know, no one has yet produced a vaccine to protect against Adi Badenhorst. So contagious is his lust for life that you can't help but be infected by it, whether it means you find yourself bundled into the back of his Silverado and taken on a bone-rattling tour of his vineyards or dragged into his cellar to lend a hand with the blending. Not so much a winemaker as a force of nature, he handed in his notice after 10 honourable years at Rustenberg to launch his own label A. A. Badenhorst Family Wines.
One often hears wine merchants saying that winemakers like to let the wines speak for themselves. Well, Adi's wines would be lucky to get a word in edgeways. He is a fast-talking, quick-witted, warm-hearted kind of guy; a blend of one half talent, one half intuition and one half rock star. Like our understanding of fractions, Adi's grasp on the precise technical specifications of his wines is not his strongpoint, but his aim is not perfection but personality. He may not be able to quote tartaric acid levels on request, but he is on first name terms with each of his vines. If you want to drink wines with soul that were made using gut feel rather than technical recipes, then this is definitely where you should be focusing your attention.

Today, Swartland is buzzing like California during the Gold Rush, except the lure is grapes not gold. Its fabulously old bush vines are attracting the country's most pioneering winemakers, who have been drawn to the rich variety of organically-farmed, low-yielding vines - a legacy from the early settlers in the region. Fantastic, but previously neglected, old vineyards are being brought back to life by winemakers, such as Adi, Eben Sadie, Chris Mullineux and Marc Kent.

Adi took over an ancient winery in the up-and-coming Paardeberg area of Swartland that had been built in the 1800s and had last been used in the 1930s. This meant fashionable concrete tanks and, according to the 2009 Platter Guide, a sizeable bat population. Even more importantly, they acquired 35 hectares of mature, dry-farmed bush vines, which clearly deliver great quality and complexity.

The A.A. Badenhorst Family labels seem to have divided a few people (we happen to love them!), but we thought we would mention a few details that are quite endearing. On the front label, there are a pair of secateurs on the right-hand edge, which mark the halfway point of the bottle. This was inspired by a traditional drink in the region called Oom Tas (see below), which the farm workers used to share after a hard day's work. To avoid arguments, Oom Tas made a mark on the label to show when half the bottle had been drunk. When they took the halfway mark off the label, sales plummeted, so they quickly put it back again! Beneath the vintage on the A.A. Badenhorst front label are two flowers, which represent the male and the female flowers of the vine and on the back label, Adi has cunningly transformed the boring bar code into a reed bed.

SHIPPING & RETURNS

Birmingham deliveries

We offer FREE delivery for orders £85+ within a 10 km radius of our Birmingham city centre. For orders under we charge £5.00 delivery within our 10 km radius.

National deliveries outside Birmingham

We offer FREE UK delivery for all orders £100+. Orders placed before 10am on Monday will be delivered by Friday to addresses in mainland UK, providing the wines are in stock, with some postcode exceptions. Please note that orders placed online on Saturday or Sunday will be processed on Monday, for delivery by Friday the same week.
We have no minimum order, although there is a minimum delivery charge of £9.00 for orders under £100 in order to cover our logistical costs.
We try to ensure delivery is made within 5 working days.
For orders under £100 we have worked hard to find the best price we can, bearing in mind that wine is both heavy and fragile. We use ParcelForce couriers who specialise in due care and diligence with fragile and liquids.

European and Worldwide Delivery

Please contact us direct for a quote. Given the complexity of shipping wine internationally we will provide a bespoke price based on requirements.

Bank Holidays

Our couriers do not operate over bank holidays, therefore additional time will be taken into account if an 'order to delivery window' is processed over a bank holiday.

Returns

We offer free replacement on all stock if proven to be damaged in transit.
If our products are proven to be out of condition on arrival we offer replacement stock to the same value.

 

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