Wie maak die jol vol? Vin-atics maak die jol vol!
Last month, you’ll remember Jan Braai let our Vin-atics braai go out, he was having so much fun klets-ing with Favourite Vinatic, Pete Goffe-Wood. Yup. THAT’s how much fun we have at our Food24 wine club. (Not a member yet? Sign up here… it’s free!)
Well, this month, we’ve decided to rectify February’s rather startling failure. So, for our March Vin-atics, we decided to invite a whole batch of folks that may be crass, loud, rude, appallingly uncultured and noisy… but WOULD NEVER LET A BRAAI GO OUT.
Yup. This month, we’ve gone zef.
And while that might mean the actual braai fire is sorted, it is rather a poser on the wine front. After much wailing and gnashing of teeth, our horrified Wine Editor, Her Lushiness Cathy Marston, pulled herself together and decided on the following wines for this, her hardest themed Vin-atics nights.
The Wines
2009 Delheim Heerenwijn Sauvignon/Chenin (R24.99 from Ultra Liquors) – apparently the owner, Spatz Sterling, originally wanted to call this ‘pub wine’. 35 years and still going strong, baby.
2010 Drostdy-Hof ‘doos wyn’ Savignon Blanc – winner of Spit or Swallow’s Inaugural Box Wine Challenge, this R71.99 3 litre box definitely deserved a spot at the edge of our zef table.
2010 Hermanuspietersfontein Sauvignon Blanc No.7 (R80 from the farm) – because we are a wine club, dammit. And this crisp, limey, terribly classy wine is from Bartho Eksteen, current Diner’s Club Winemaker of the year.
2008 Lula Afrika Shiraz (R30 from Ultra Liquors) – easy drinking with plenty of soft, juicy black fruit… this is the quintessential braai wine!
Bob’s Your Uncle The Red Wine Brew (R20 from the farm, Wine Village, Hermanus) – Dude. It comes in a beer bottle! Of course it made our zef cut.
2009 Rietvallei Red Muscadel (R44.99 from Ultra Liquors) – Sweet fruit with lots of balance and length; a fitting end to any braai.
The Food
Chef Caro (just back from maternity leave… ready for her first Vin-atics!) chose the following dishes to pair with our March wines. Can you guess which course goes with which wine? Otherwise check out Cathy’s tasting notes here.
Braaied snoek
Beer can chicken
Goat’s cheese braaibroodjie with tomato chilli jam
Oxtail potjie
Gemsbok Sosaties
Bar One bananas
The Main Event
We’re going to be braaiing some of these dishes and drinking all of the wines on Tuesday 2nd March. Joining us will be Food24’s favourite son Sardines on Toast (aka Bokkoms Boy), Zef rockstar watkykjy blogger and Wedding DJ, Ch0pp3r and their ridiculously poorly behaved partners. We’re hoping the usual Food24 crew (Cathy, Sam, Cath and Chef Caro) can keep the ship from going too horribly off course. You can follow events on Twitter @vinatics or on any of us individually.
The Vin-atics Challenge – win all 6 March wines!
Come on. We know there are a lot of non-snobby wine lovers out there who’d love to play along with us Tuesday night (or any night in March for that matter.)
All you have to do is
• choose a couple of the recipes above
• get hold of a bottle or two of these March wines
• invite a few friends round and have a braai!
• take lots of pictures and either email them to us at editor@food24.com telling us how it went or post on your blog and send us the link.
The best report sent to us before the end of the month will win a full set of Match Vin-atics wines! Can you make the jol vol?