2022 Sadie Family Soldaat, Piekenierskloof

Eben Sadie buys the grapes for this wine from Erasmus and Bielie van Zyl's farm in Piekenierskloof. Comparatively pale in colour but certainly not lacking in perfume or intensity, it's subtle, ethereal Grenache of great precision. Fermented with 50% whole bunches, it has flavours of rooibos tea, pomegranate and wild strawberry and a racy, stony finish. 

95 points Tim Atkin MW South Africa Report 2023

Bursting with a bright, fresh nose with crunchy red fruit aromas, the 2022 Old Vine Series Soldaat displays impeccable balance and crystalline purity from a challenging vintage. Medium-bodied and with lively acidity and delicate mineral tension, the Grenache bursts with bright red fruit flavors, even though it spent less time on the skins and clocks in with some of the lowest alcohol for the bottling. Only 6,800 bottles were filled with 50% whole-cluster Grenache. Bravo, I want more!

94+ points Anthony Mueller robertparker.com

Old Vine Series. 13% alc. Soldaat is 100% Grenache from a parcel of 55-year-old vines in the highland Piekenierskloof region, just shy of the Swartland catchment, going north to Citrusdal. The vineyard got its name from the foot soldiers (piekeniers) who once used this area as a lookout. Hence the name Soldaat (Soldier). Sadie’s easterly facing parcel sits around 780 meters—one of the Cape’s highest elevations—and the soil is decomposed granite. The vines here are unirrigated, and still on their own rootstock.

Eben notes that The Piekenierskloof Pass has firmly positioned itself as the leading location for Cape Grenache, capable of giving vibrant, perfumed wines with lifted red fruit, smoky, spicy notes and earthy minerality. This wine calls to mind the elegant, perfumed Garnachas from Gredos and San Martín de Valdeiglesias in the Madrid highlands, yet with precision and class all its own. And at 13% alcohol, it’s entirely different from the heavy, alcoholic wines often associated with Grenache. Crafted from yields of 22 hl/ha, Soldaat ferments and matures in concrete tanks (with 60% whole bunches this year).