Cat’s Cradle 2020

Thorne & Daughters, teknisk ark/fact sheet (thorneanddaughters.com – linket fra thorneanddaughters.com, hentet 2026-10-18): 2020 Thorne & Daughters Cat’s Cradle – område: Swartland; druer: Chenin Blanc; alkohol 13.1%. Producentens noter (engelsk): About the wine: THE WINE The 2020 was the beginning of the end of the terrible drought that afflicted the Cape over the last few years, and it was refreshing to be working with some water during the growing season. That said, many of the vineyards were still feeling the hangover of the drought and their reserves were very depleted. 2020 was a relatively early harvest because of this and it was not a year to wait around for high ripeness levels. I think the previous years provided a good training ground for making sure that we picked the 2020 grapes early enough. That said, many of the wines were naturally a touch riper which has lent a lovely generosity to the vintage. Chenin blanc on granite is something that we have worked with for all the years that we have been making our Thorne and Daughters wines, though Cat’s Cradle was only first released in 2017 as a single vineyard wine. Overall in the industry, yields were up around 8% due to the increased water availability, but in the case of the Langkloof vineyard our yields were still very low due to cool, windy conditions during flowering, so unfortunately we still made very little wine from this vineyard in 2020. We've kept our winemaking simple and natural, as we have no desire to stand between the vineyard and its expression as a wine in the glass. The grapes are whole-bunch pressed in an old basket press and there are no additions of sulphur dioxide made on the juice. A rough settling follows pressing after which the wines undergo natural alcoholic and malolactic fermentation in old oak barrels. We add some sulphur dioxide late in the winter, and then again at bottling, keeping the level of sulphur dioxide as low as possible. The result is wines that show tension without losing their suppleness and core, and wines that will reward time in the cellar. THorne & DaucHuHrTerRs hello@thorneanddaughters.com * www.thorneanddaughters.com RAISING OUR HANDCRAFTED WINES ALONG WITH OUR Two DAUGHTERS