This is a more highly priced South-African wine than those I used to drink until now. I am not yet a great fan of South Africans, although all of them I tried were of solid quality. But I often find these red wines to have quite intense smoke aromas, ranging from slightly smoked ham, to heavily smoked bacon. It’s maybe a matter of taste, but I feel that these smokey notes are somehow unbalancing the wines. Now this Mont du Toît, which is a common project of German winemaker Bernd Philippi and the South African Pieter Niel-Rossouw, is a Cuvée of Cabernet, Merlot and Shiraz. It still has smokiness, but to a lesser extent. Obviously it is a note SA wines can’t come without and I have to live with that. But beyond that note, the Mont du Toît also had a beautifully structured body with opulence and creaminess, elegant fruit, and a nice finish with a slight freshness. No doubt someone put some serious work in that wine.
