A very good place to start.
Before Do-re-mi gets stuck in your heads, let’s get stuck into this story.
In celebration of the end of a very busy year, Jeremy has decided to offer two very special wines at the tasting and sales room in Paarl. These two amazing Borg Family Wines Shiraz 2005 and Shiraz 2006 are absolutely delicious! Confirmed by our serious panel of tasters – the Borg family at Christmas.
In 2005, Jeremy had been working for wine companies for a couple of years and had been offered some excess grapes from the 2005 harvest. The whole family got stuck in and produced 1634 bottles of Borg Family Wines Shiraz 2005 with borrowed equipment, in rented cellar space. You can download the tasting notes here.
That maiden vintage from the Borgs was the first to be exported to the USA with Southern Starz placing an order in 2007. They were our first importers and still remain our representatives in the USA to this day.
Judging from the 2006 tasting notes, the wine making bug had bitten. This time the volumes had increased with 3808 bottles being produced. This wine would go on to win a Swiss International Air Lines Wine Award, not bad for a second wine! Download the tasting notes here.
What about that tasting?
You can taste these two extraordinary wines at 125 Main Road, Paarl between 9am and 2pm on Monday 31 December only.
If you want to purchase these wines, they are selling for R350 a bottle or R1000 for 3 (1 x 2005 and 2 x 2006 only)
We are not hyping it up when we say that stocks are limited. There are only 10 bottles of the 2005 available and around 20 of the 2006, so it really is a case of “while stocks last”
Interested in more history?
The original newsletters from 2007 make for interesting reading. The Borgs are now two years into their part-time wine venture, with a new harvest happening with the entire family pitching in. In January and February, they are getting grapes from Billy Hughes at Kasteelsig (referred to as Castle view in the letters) and trying not to make white wine, except they get some Viognier…
By June, the shipment has departed to the USA and the Borgs are looking forward to a little post harvest family time, but they didn’t escape wine, they just transferred their skills to a different continent and helped plant a vineyard with friends in Europe.
In October it is clear that they have taken the giant leap forward and decided to make wine full time: “Jeremy is now a ‘free’ man having just finished his full time job with the Company of Wine People. He is feeling very confident and upbeat about being able to focus all his attention on Borg Family Wines and our new wine business we have been developing – The Painted Wolf Wine Company.”
Which is how we came to this point in time. For a brief look at the highlights you can refer to our timeline.
If you would like to read the original newsletters in full, you can download them here: