A superb dessert wine, light-to-medium gold in color. The nose is very fragrant and hints at roses, apricots and honey on a hot windless day. The delicate flavors of the roses and apricots come through on the taste and are held together by wisps of Rooibos tea, ending with pine nuts.

A dessert wine with a South African twist. The sweet Muscat grapes have been sun dried on organic Rooibos (“Red Bush”) tea leaves (a tea native to South Africa), Vin de Paille style. The idea is to gently infuse the naturally caffeine and tannin -free tea with the grapes during the drying, without adding tea to the must. The grapes are dried to 50 % moisture-loss, lying on the tea before crushing and de-stemming. This creates a truly unique one-of-a-kind wine that is like a little sip of Heaven here on Earth.

Wine maker notes

Produced from the finest Muscat grapes from the cooler coastal area of the Olifants river valley region. The grapes are first cooled to 0 Deg C before destemming and gas macerated for 7 days at 13 – 16 Deg C. Natural fermentation takes place in stainless steel or flexi-tanks by controlled temperature increases to 26 Deg C for a further 80 – 95 days. All though this is a sweet dessert wine it is treated in the cellar the same as a regular white wine to keep the sugars from becoming overbearing. All pump overs are done by inert gas and gravity, once the ferment is complete the wine is tank aged for atleast 3 months before bottling. Bottling with the latest technology and onsite ingenuity.

Technical notes

Alcohol 11.43 % Total Acidity 6.3 g/l PH 3.85 Residual Sugar 128.3 g/l Total SO2 <56 ppm Free SO2 22 ppm

Food pairing

Great with rich cheeses, poured over apple pie, vanilla ice-cream or just on the rocks under the stars. It’s pure heaven at first sip.

Producer

Stellar Winery, South Africa’s largest producer of fine organic wines, processes organically-grown grapes for the South African and export markets. The grapes are drawn from farms in the Lower Olifants River Valley, part of the Namaqualand area of the Western Cape. This is an area famous for its spring flowers and is also the only semi-arid Biosphere hotspot in the world. Situated in the Namaqualand hamlet of Trawal, Stellar Winery is privately owned, with the workers having a 26% shareholding in the cellar. Well-known for its innovative approach, Stellar has achieved a number of ”firsts” in the wine industry. It was the first organic winemaking operation in the world to gain FLO Fairtrade certification and the first cellar in Africa to produce commercially viable no-sulphur-added wines. Stellar has subsequently become the largest producer of these wines in the world and is the number one organic wine brand in the UK. The organic vineyards and winemaking process are fully certified by the internationally recognised Control Union Certifications, based in the Netherlands. Stellar’s fair trade certification has delivered positive, measurable changes in working and living conditions to the Stellar workforce through the the global sales of fairly-traded wine. The surrounding Trawal community has also benefited from fair trade through the company’s support of local institutions such as the pre-school, primary school and football club.