2021 Mother Rock 'Brutal!' Chenin Blanc Swartland

Winemaker Notes:  The oxidative handling gives this wine a deliciously smoky, nutty quality. It has a certain spice akin to peppercorns and a tang like cider, though a distinctive fruit purity this year thanks to concrete aging. It is best when consumed rapidly, but that shouldn’t be much of a problem.

Johan Meyer, AKA “Stompie”, has made a name for himself in the ever-emerging South African wine industry in a very short time. While his namesake Signature wines reflect his love of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, Stompie is not one to limit himself and thus created the Mother Rock Wines wines in collaboration with his UK importer Ben Henshaw of Indigo Wines. After seeing the market quickly drink up the initial Force Celeste wines (formerly known as Force Majure), they expanded the offerings to include a label called Mother Rock, focused on discovering exceptional parcels of sustainably-farmed vines grown on a variety of soil types. The identity of these two brands is rooted deep in the South African wine industry with Chenin Blanc at the root of the whites and field blends of the reds. These are terroir-focused wines made to offer drinkability and enjoyment, and it doesn’t hurt that the labels are beautiful. Much like his eponymous wines, he has long-term contracts with some of the best growers in the Southern Cape determined to farm their sites organically. In the winery there is no SO2 added before or during fermentation but it’s a natural element that comes from the vines and you will always end up with some SO2 in the wines. That being said the wines are lightly sulfured before bottling for preservation and stability. Ultimately Mother Rock is about showcasing the best and purest expression of South Africa’s diverse terroir.

Johan was the first South African producer to receive the invite to the exclusive ‘Brutal!’ club of winemakers. Brutal! started from a conversation three winemakers had a few years back (two are Catalan and one is French). The two Catalans, Laureano Serras and Joan Ramon Escoda exclaimed when tasting one of Anthony Tortul’s wines that it was ‘Brutal!’ or as Americans would say ‘dope/kick ass.’ Anthony didn’t get the reference and thought they were saying the wine was garbage. So he made a quick makeshift label with ‘Brutal!’ handwritten and the rest is history. Today ‘Brutal!’ is very much part of the ‘natural’ or ‘raw’ wine movement. The only requirements are that it’s ‘zero/zero’, meaning nothing added and nothing taken out. It also signifies the wine that is an experiment. Johan Meyer a.k.a. Stompie puts his mark on this 100% Chenin Blanc version from a vineyard site near Malmesbury in the Swartland. It joins the vault of ‘Brutal!’ wines made by natural-wine pundits such as Christian Tschida, Valentina Passelacqua, Matassa, and Do.t.e. The grapes were harvested manually by taste (not potential alcohol level) to insure good mouthfeel of pH and acidity, structure, and aromas. After seven days of skin maceration, bunches were pressed to concrete tanks where spontaneous fermentation was carried out without the skins. The wine remained in concrete for 14 months, after which it was racked straight to the bottling line and bottled. No pre-racking or any movement of the wine, no filtering, no fining, and certainly no SO2.