Malu Lambert: My top 10 wines of 2024

Who doesn’t love a trip to London? I may live in a wine-producing country, but London? It’s the beating heart of the wine world.

This was my first visit to Decanter in situ, and I was invited to taste on the Stellenbosch Cabernet Sauvignon 2017 Panel Tasting. The wines on show highlighted how producers are pushing stylistic differences, from Banghoek to Bottelary, rather than just ‘Stellenbosch’.

The top contender was Le Riche Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 2017.

Scroll down for Malu’s top 10 South African wines of 2024

While in the UK I jumped on a train to Sussex to visit the Jordans (of Jordan Wine Estate in Stellenbosch) at the medieval Mousehall. They’ve just released the maiden Tidebrook Wines.

I mention this as they’re not the only South Africans prospecting English vineyards, there’s a growing number – an interesting trend to watch.

South Africa’s ‘secret weapon’

Touching down in Cape Town, it was straight back to tasting for Decanter. This time for My top 20 South African white blends article. Eben Sadie’s Palladius 2022, an iconic Chenin-based blend, is proof that South Africa’s secret weapon is having this grape as its backbone.

Boasting the majority plantings of Chenin Blanc in the world, we may as well make good use of it. Using Chenin as ballast also has the advantage of being uniquely South African; where else do you find such a preponderance of premium Chenin-based cuvées?

That said, the Sauvignon-Semillons also fared well. What’s surprising is that for the relatively high quality, producers find this blend difficult to sell. Consumers would rather reach for a straight Sauvignon Blanc.

Adept with both grapes is winemaker Trizanne Barnard. One afternoon at her beachside home, we dove into her 2023 Seascape range. The stand-out was the Sondagskloof White 2023: wild fermented, some barrel, half skin-contact Sauvignon, named for a tiny Cape South Coast ward.

Barnard is not alone in experimenting: the use of oak, spontaneous fermentation, lees contact et al, is on the rise. This was illustrated by the Sauvignon Blanc category winner in Platter’s South African Wine Guide 2025: Diemersdal Wild Horseshoe 2023 – which makes use of all of those techniques.

Celebrating success

Some personal successes this year included being named a finalist in the inaugural 67 Pall Mall Global Wine Communicator Awards. Then, while in Zanzibar I got the news that I managed to not only clinch the WSET Diploma, but also win three of the modules.

Fine wine is not readily available on the island, so I settled for an ice cold beer – which tasted pretty good! Back home we celebrated by popping a bottle of the Silverthorn Jewel Box 2019.

Suddenly, we were in the thick of release season. Duncan Savage’s release at his urban winery was memorable. A seamless, confident showing, with the Girl Next Door 2023 rising to the top using Syrah parcels from both Noordhoek and Fish Hoek.

These unusual growing areas were chosen partly, I suspect, for the opportunity to surf between pickings…

From one surfer to another: Miles Mossop and the launch of his Cab-led Sam 2021 at Salon by chef-patron Luke Dale Roberts. Something that struck me was how much more elegant Mossop’s wines have become after leaving the life of a salaried winemaker in 2018.

Varieties to watch

While Salon was a feast for the palate, sometimes simple food seems to make wines shine all the brighter. The Roodekrantz 2023 release tasting at a dive bar underscored this.

Six excellent Chenin Blancs that were nuanced, characterful and carried the signature of their sites. Has there been a more impressive Chenin showcase since Chris Alheit?

While hard to choose – it was the Roodekrantz Die Kliphuis 2023 that pipped the post. Roodekrantz is smart to bet on this workhorse; the premiumisation of Chenin Blanc is becoming a thing.

So much so, that there’s a well-funded research project on the go with this as its focus. Could we soon have a Chenin brand equivalent to Cloudy Bay?

Another cultivar of the moment is undoubtedly Grenache. Suited to hotter climes, dry-land farming and bush-vine cultivation (like in Spain, a South African speciality) we’re seeing the emergence of more single-varietal bottlings.

Probably my favourite tasting of the year benchmarked some top SA Grenache against international bottlings in Joostenberg’s tasting room. One of the attending producers, Marelise Niemann, is so passionate about the variety that she makes four different regional versions.

Her Momento Grenache Noir Piekenierskloof 2022 proves that Grenache can deliver in cooler wards, too.

Don’t forget Chardonnay

Chardonnay has somewhat taken a backseat to Chenin in recent years, but the launch of the Chardonnay Association of South Africa in November, which already has 55 members, has bolstered the variety.

Overall the quality at the launch tasting was outstanding, with Restless River’s Ava Marie Chardonnay 2022 disappearing most quickly in my glass. The diversity of sites on display was particularly interesting, such as the high-lying vines in the Sutherland-Karoo district.

My final (professional, that is) wine lunch of the year took place at my local, The Foodbarn, presided over by the inimitable chef Franck Dangereux. I met with distributor David Clarke of Ex Animo, who had a number of interesting pours.

The Testalonga El Bandito Skin Chenin Blanc 2024 makes the cut here for how distinctly South African it is, there’s just simply nowhere else in the world that it could come from. And that is something to celebrate.

Malu Lambert’s top 10 South African wines of 2024

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