My father recently read about a Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz Blend from Withington Wines, a wine estate in the Darling region. He asked me to please taste the wine as he was interested in purchasing some. I contacted Withington Wines to find out where the wine was sold locally but they don’t have a sales outlet anywhere near to us. So, as I had to order 12 wines to get them delivered to me, I decided to hold an informal wine tasting. I chose 3 red wines to taste – the Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz, the Carignan, and a Pinotage. The wines were paid for and delivered and the guests were invited. I decided that an informal group made up of Norman McFarlane, his wife Eppie, Erica Liebenberg and Dave and I would be a good mix. As we were doing the wine tasting after lunch I only did cheese platter and meat platters to accompany our tasting. On the Saturday morning of the tasting, Dave worked on the house while I got things ready and about 2 hours before our guests were due I opened the box. The first bottle of wine that I took out was cold – and the label was wet, and it turned out that instead of the Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz blend, I had been sent some Chardonnay, which must have been put into the box chilled. I called and spoke to Charles Withington who was devastated for me! His wife drove from Darling to meet Dave at the airport – an hour’s drive each way for both of them. She swapped the 4 incorrect wines for a case of the Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz, and Dave got home with minutes to spare before the guests arrived.
I planned a blind tasting and placed the wines in the following order – Pinotage, Carignan, Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz, and invited my guests to give open opinions about the wine, before I shared with them what they tasted. After I told them which wine was which, we moved on to assessing the wines with the food. Here are some of our tasting notes and thoughts:
Pinotage
- bright and earthy red colour
- tobacco nose
- black fruit
- grassy
- cedar note with some vanilla spice
- red berries and cherries
- starts well
- smooth
- sweetish
- gentle acidity with soft tannins
- sharp
- fresh
- dry aftertaste
- easy drinking
- we all judges this 3rd
Carignan
- berries and plums
- some red fruits
- black fruit
- umami
- polished leather
- savoury
- dry
- subtle
- smooth
- full mid palate
- edgy tannins
- pleasing end
- persistent finish
- fruity finish
- majority voted this 1st
Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz
- dark plummy red in colour
- red berry on nose
- plenty ripe fruit
- opulent black fruit nose
- polished leather
- vanilla
- some spice
- lingers on the palate
- complex
- smooth
- good table wine
- high alcohol
- well balanced
- nice longevity
- majority voted this 2nd
The end result of our tasting is that my Dad ordered 20 cases of the Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz Blend wine!
Disclosure: I was given wine at no charge. I have not been compensated for this post and neither was I asked to write a positive review. This is in line with my blogging policy.
I love wine tastings and I am not surprised the Carignan was elected your favourite! I am wondering now what your father ordered?
I have done an edit! he ordered the Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz Blend 🙂
I really love Pinotage — it is such a unique wine and one that it only made in South Africa I believe. Your review of the Withington sounds lovely. Great idea to have a wine tasting with munchies with friends!
I want to do this again as it was so much fun 🙂
Good thing you were able to get the correct wine in time for your tasting Tandy but what a bother! I love that you did a wine tasting – such a great idea.
🙂 Mandy
I aim to do more in the new year Mandy 🙂
Sounds like a nice set of wines. Good way to spend an afternoon,even with the emergency airport trip:)
a perfect way to spend an afternoon indeed Roger 🙂
All three sound delicious.
they are very drinkable 🙂
I love wine tasting! Sounds like your dad picked up on a ton of flavor in these!
we all contributed to the notes! I love wine drinking 😉
A very interesting post! I don’t know much about wines but they all sound good.
We are big wine drinkers here Asmita 🙂
What a fun idea. I think I might need to take a wine class or something before doing this. However I am all about the munchies to go with the wine tasting.
the munchies really helped keep us under control LOL 🙂
what a beautiful wine tasting night! You are always very careful to organize perfect tables for your guests…the wine notes are very interesting.
thank you for the compliment Rita 🙂
This was a lovely tasting, thoroughly enjoyed by all involved! Thanks Tandy for setting it all up and well done for blogging with your characteristic quality!
Thank you for joining us! It is always a pleasure to have you at the table 🙂