Tin Soldier 2024

Thorne & Daughters, teknisk ark/fact sheet (thorneanddaughters.com – linket fra thorneanddaughters.com, hentet 2026-10-18): 2024 Thorne & Daughters Tin Soldier – område: Swartland; druer: Sémillon Gris; alkohol 12.8%. Producentens noter (engelsk): About the wine: THE W INE Our pick of the Tin Soldier vineyard is usually in the latter part of our season and the 2024 harvest was right in the normal timeframe, so the heatwaves of January were not really an issue here. The last few years I have taken care to get enough skin ripeness here so that we don’t sacri fice complexity in the wines. Still, these are poor granite soils so we can’t hang the grapes out forever. This wine is composed of a portion of grapes which are pressed to old oak barrels and another portion which is fermented on skins (no stems) for 7-10 days in open vats. Later in the year we play a little with these blending components to get the texture and weight of th e wine just right. The interplay of fruit and aromatic lift from the direct pressed wines, and the savoury tones from the skin-fermentation is key to this wine’s appeal. If we go back 100 years, Semillon was responsible for probably 95% of the wine made in this country. Tim James’ research on the variety suggests that the red mutation may at one time have been even more common than the white. I’m really fascinated by the idea of the kind of wines that would have been made in the old days using these mixed vineyards, and this led me to the idea of fermenting the grapes on their skins for a few days to bring out more of the colour and texture of this wonderful grape. All of our wines take their names from archetypal childrens’ toys, and Tin Soldier takes its name from Semillon’s status as the old footsoldier of the South African industry. Much like the old toy soldiers buried in the garden, Semillon has been reduced to a mere shadow of its former glory days in the Cape Th o r n e & D a u g h t e r s hello@thorneanddaughters.com • www.thorneanddaughters.com Raising our handcrafted wines along with our two Daughters