A halfway house to heaven, Klein Roosboom is a place where the sweet perfume of roses is upstaged only by the bouquet of fine wine. Errieda du Toit followed her nose to this remarkable family-owned farm in the heart of the Durbanville wine valley.
"Can't help falling in love". Elvis's sixties classic plays on the car radio as I return from a spring lunch with Karin de Villiers, the effervescent winemaker at Klein Roosboom. Perhaps I am just a little bit heady from the bubbly, or high from the post-lunch shopping spree at Rubies & Roses, the quirky cellar-based décor shop started by her daughter Marné – whatever the reason, I am truly smitten. And I'm not alone.
Ask anyone who's spent time on this family farm in the Durbanville wine valley, be it a fleeting visit to stock up on the fun-loving Bandana wine for “not-so-serious-Sauvignon drinkers”; a leisurely tasting of the award-winning Merlot or Cab; or a light lunch at the deli, and all will tell you they leave somewhat infatuated.
LEMONGRASS SYRUP FOR FRUIT SALAD
Karin serves her tropical fruit salad with a delicious lemongrass syrup. To make the syrup: boil ½ cup water with 225 g caster sugar, the zest of 1 lemon, the seeds and husk of 1 vanilla pod and 1–2 stalks lemongrass, crushed, until thick and syrupy. Remove from the heat and add ½ cup crushed ice. Discard the lemongrass stalks and vanilla pod and allow to cool. Pour over the fruit salad before serving.
Karin and husband Jean have been living on this 260-hectare piece of heaven for nearly 30 years, she initially running the farm dairy. When it was sold a decade later, Karin jumped at the chance to make wine and wasted no time in doing a short winemaking course. “A very short one,” she laughs. “It lasted all of one weekend. “I’d always dreamt of making my own sparkling wine,” she continues, describing how she’d visualise the bottles stacked in the cellar under crystal chandeliers.
She even named her daughter – and her exquisite Méthode Cap Classique – after Marné, an area in the Champagne-Ardenne region of France. “When I was in matric, my friend Albertus and I would use our pocket money to buy bubbly, which we’d haul out from its hiding place under his bed when an occasion called for it.” She produced her maiden 2007 vintage of a few hundred bottles of MCC in time to be released at Marné's 21st birthday.
RUM AND RUBY GRAPEFRUIT DRINK
To make this deliciously refreshing spring drink: mix 1 tot Bacardi white rum with 250 ml ruby grapefruit juice and serve with crushed ice, mint and slices of ruby grapefruit.
It comes as no surprise to those who know her that Karin chose to make her debut into the world of winemaking with sparkling wine, instead of going the more traditional red-wine route. This is, after all, a woman who ran with the bulls in her dairy-farming days.
“I’m actually a phone-a-friend-winemaker,” she quips modestly as she opens the specially imported glass top of her awardwinning Sauvignon Blanc to pour the perfect accompaniment to a home-made pasta dotted with smoked salmon roses and caperberries and drizzled in a lemon-butter sauce.
“Nothing but the best for a bottle that carries a billet-doux to the love of your life.”
Indeed, all Karin’s wine labels are distinguished by dedications to her family: the Klein Roosboom Sauvignon Blanc to husband Jean (“whose passion for the vine I’ve attempted to capture in the bottle”), the Merlot to eldest son Nicol (“berries and spice and aromas so nice – that’s what men like you are made of”), and the Cabernet to younger son Johan (“a perfect match for both your physique and your personality. Strong and robust.”)
True to her vision, Rubies & Roses is festooned with chandeliers dripping with delicate tea cups and silver spoons. Prints of 17th-century pastoral landscapes, angels and flush-cheeked cherubs contrast with industrialstyle stainless-steel wine vats, while brightly coloured handbags and wreaths woven from dried vines add an idiosyncratic touch.
A fantastic cook and hostess, Karin doesn't, however, hesitate to call in the help of friends. For our lunch, Christina de Jongh has whipped up a granadilla soufflé with nougat cream, a perfect match for the wine.
Karin and Christina cook, travel and fish together, the last, they confess, not without a bottle of bubbly in the cooler bag. Play hard, work hard. “Winemaking is like child rearing,” says Karin. “It doesn't keep office hours.”
TRY A FEW RECIPES BY KARIN DE VILLIERS: