White Blend

This is an expressive wine that can be enjoyed on its own or served with most pasta, poultry or fish dishes.

The name Quoin Rock found its inspiration from the Agulhas area the most southern tip of Africa where Quoin Point is the second most southernly point and where Quoin Rock Wines’ conservation farm Boskloof is located. Ships rounding the cape on their way back from or to markets in the east from the mid-1400’s to these modern times would stop over at the cape of good hope — todays Table Bay Harbour Cape Town to replenish their boats with fresh produce. Farms like Quoin Rock would rush produce to the harbour and from the late 1660’s wines from South Africa started forming part of the goods delivered to the port. Now just over 350 years later South African wines are still exported from Table Bay harbour. While wine production is the main activity at Quoin Rock in Stellenbosch the Agulhas farm Boskloof focuses on conservation. Bontebok springbok eland and zebra have been reintroduced to this area.

The Sauvignon Blanc grapes of the QR White Blend are grown on two of our farms; Boskloof, situated in the Agulhas area, and Quoin Rock in the Stellenbosch area. On Boskloof, the vines grow in Bokkeveld, Koffieklip and gravel and are constantly exposed to the cool Atlantic Ocean breeze. On Quoin Rock, the vines have been planted nearly 400 meters above sea level in decomposed granite, colluvial sandstone and gravel and grow in a slightly warmer climate. The Semillon that makes up the rest of the wine, is grown against the Simonsberg mountain.

We pick these grapes early to ensure that the berries stay cool until they get to the cellar. Once the grapes are in the cellar, we destem and crush the berries gently. After letting the must settle in the tanks for up to two days, we rack off the juice and inoculate it to start fermentation. We ferment each batch separately to let the grapes develop their own unique aromas and flavour compounds. By applying this small-batch winemaking philosophy, we can develop a complex and diverse wine.

The wine is made in a reductive style to preserve the aromatic fruit profile. Fermentation took place in a combination of stainless steel tanks and oak barrels. The individual components were kept separate and underwent regular battonage (lees stirring).