Ernest Pinot Noir

Beef, Veal, Game (deer, venison), Poultry

Hasher Family Estate is a family-owned farm in South Africa’s sought after Upper Hemel-en-Aarde Valley. Founded by the Herten-Haspeslagh family, the farm represents the coming together of centuries of European farming heritage with a lifelong passion for Africa. Run by a young and passionate team, the farm proudly produces exceptional wines that celebrate the cool maritime climate and unique soil the area has become known for.

After a relatively warm winter, which lead to an early bud break, the spring months were exceptionally dry. With the spring storms staying away, there was no wind to disturb the flowers and the superb berry setting gave us high hopes for an easy season with high yields. However, nature threw use a curve ball in the middle of harvest with lots of rain in February and March. We had almost 230 mm of rain in these two months, which is 2,5 times the average. Picking decisions were thus based both on phenolic ripeness and weather forecast.

Kept in 228L French oak barrels for 3 months before racked and returned to same barrels for a further 8 months using 27% new wood.

The chilled grapes were all sorted by hand before destemmed and gravity fed into fermenters. Processed and gravity fed into small open top fermenters to ensure gentle cap submersion during fermentation. The grapes were partly inoculated with selected yeast strains and the remaining was left to run wild with native yeast strains. Gentle punch downs used when required, softly pressed at 1°B, left to settle in stainless steel tank.