Description
The 2021 Raats MR de Compostella is a Bordeaux-style blend, crafted from 35% Cabernet Sauvignon, 26% Cabernet Franc, 20% Merlot, 17% Malbec, and 2% Petit Verdot. This deep, dark ruby wine offers complex aromas of black currant, black cherry, violets, cedar, and cinnamon, with a rich finish of dark chocolate and blackberry. The blend is carefully crafted for balance and harmony, ensuring no variety dominates, with a polished and defined finish.
Food pairing:
Well-aged sirloin, rib-eye, or filet mignon, hard cheeses, lamb, beef, venison.
Reviews
Greg Sherwood 99
The MR de Compostella from Bruwer Raats and Mzokhona Mvemve possesses one of the most successful critical track records out of almost any red wine produced in South Africa let alone just in the Cape Bordeaux Blend category. The newest 2021 release astonishingly takes this wine to yet another higher niveau of quality with a blend of 26% Cabernet Franc, 35% Cabernet Sauvignon, 17% Malbec, 20% Merlot and 2% Petit Verdot. Made from vines aged between 9 and 22 years old, all grown on deep decomposed dolomitic granite soils with table mountain sandstone, the aromatics are wonderfully bold and exuberant displaying seductive notes of blackberries, creme de cassis, violets, sweet cherry tobacco, black cherries and tart black plum. The lifted perfumed intensity is incredibly pure and piercing with salty liquorice, cedar spice and beautifully detailed maritime oyster shell nuances. In the mouth, the concentration and focused steely intensity is astounding – tart, bright and architecturally soaring, shaping this wine into a powerful, linear, multi-dimensional masterpiece. Packed full of salty cassis, tart plum and black currant, the tightly wound core of power, refined extraction and polished marble tannins leave you in no doubt that this harmonious, vibrant beauty is a spellbinding, timeless classic in the making. If you wanted just one wine to convince an international fine wine connoisseur of the true greatness of South Africa s finest terroirs and winemaking, you have found your candidate! Simply an incredible wine. Drink this beauty from 2024 and savour over the next 30+ years. But you might need more than just one or two cases in your cellar!! (Wine Safari Score: 99/100 Greg Sherwood MW) [Greg Sherwood, 26/06/2024]
Producer Profile
Bruwer Raats founded Raats Family Wines in 2000, and since then has narrowed his focus on Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc, with only one blend, The Jasper Red blend. He believed that specialising would lead to success, and this belief was not unfounded, as today, Raats Family Wines is regarded as a leader of South African Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc. Raats has received consistent local and international accolades and was named Winery of the Year for the 2018 Platter’s Guide with 5 out of 6 wines achieving five-star ratings. As Neal Martin says, ‘Cabernet Franc does not get better than at Raats’.