Blankbottle Familiemoord 750ml

“When it comes to Familiemoord, having all the components of a similar vintage are not that important to me. The 2019 vintage Grenache was a little bit lighter than usual. I had in barrel some 2018 and a little bit of that made the Grenade component a little bit plusher and when you mix different vintages the wine needs to be labelled as a non-vintage. The Grenache fermented whole clusters in an open top fermentation vessel. The 2018 component is from a trellised vineyard in Wellington where the 2019 is from a bush Vine Organically Certified Wellington Vineyard. The Pinot noir from Elgin were fermented 50% whole cluster and the Cinsaut from Darling, 100% whole clusters. The fine crunchy tannins that come from the stems give this rather low in acid wine a sense of freshness.”

“In 2013, I released a wine called Familiemoord – a wine about the extraordinary but true story of how the police thought I killed my son and buried him in a shallow grave in the vacant property next to our house. The Cape Argus’ article on 11 May 2013 about the incident titled  “The mystery of the boy in the sandpit” serves as this wine’s label.

Don’t worry, my son is alive and well and is turning 14 in September –  7 years after I “killed” him. This wine has generated the most reaction of any wine I have ever produced – and not for any of the reasons a winemaker would hope for. In fact, most people were totally oblivious as to the terroir (Swartland) or cultivar (Grenache noir) of the 2013 vintage! Some countries were uncomfortable with the name, so in 2015 I stopped producing it.

But in 2018 when the dust has settled Familiemoord came back and this is the release of the 2019 – which in this case is not a 2019 but a non vintage… A blend of Wellington Grenache, Elgin Pinot and Darling Cinsaut.

When it comes to Familiemoord, having all the components of a similar vintage are not that important to me. The 2019 vintage Grenache was a little bit lighter than usual. I had in barrel some 2018 and a little bit of that made the Grenade component a little bit plusher and when you mix different vintages the wine needs to be labelled as a non-vintage.

The  Grenache fermented whole clusters in an open top fermentation vessel. The 2018 component is from a trellised vineyard in Wellington where the 2019 is from a bush Vine Organically Certified Wellington Vineyard. The Pinot noir from Elgin were fermented 50% whole cluster and the Cinsaut from darling, 100% whole clusters.  The fine crunchy tannins that come from the stems give this rather low in acid wine a sense of freshness.

ALCOHOL (%): 13.50%

RESIDUAL SUGAR (g/L): 1.58

TOTAL ACIDITY (g/L): 4.82

PH: 3.67

The story:

October 2013

Last night, at 6 pm, my wife’s phone rang while I was doing a Pilates session (my wife is a Pilates instructor) in our living room wearing an old t-shirt and pajama pants. It was the lady that moved into our previous house just a few blocks away. “Are you OK?”,she asked my wife. “What’s going on in your street? The whole place is full of police”. I ran out into the street and she was right – there were police vans parked bumper to bumper from right in front of our house, right down to the end of the street and around the corner! A yellow police crime-scene ribbon was spun around our neighboring 7 erf property, police standing almost shoulder to shoulder and people from the area streaming in to get their piece of the action.

Now this huge property’s been vacant and for sale for many years. It is slightly run down at the moment, and the cause of much concern for the neighbours. “What’s going on?”, I asked my other neighbour. Neighbour: “No one wants to say”. As I made my way through the crowd, I could see one policeman patrolling the crime scene with the help of his German Shepard. Being the direct neighbour to the property, I was directed to an inspector not dressed in police clothing. “There’s been a murder”, he said. “Goodness…” I replied. Inspector: “Yes, a man allegedly killed a child with a spade and buried him in a shallow grave”. “Goodness…” I replied. Me: “When did this happen?”. It sort of looked like he was getting irritated with me and he reluctantly replied: “Saturday”. As my mind started to add up a few things (thinking maybe this is where I should just keep silent and walk away), I asked the next question: “Where did he bury the child?” Inspector: “You see where the dog’s at? right there”. “OOOOPSSSS”, I replied, “that was me…”

You see, on Saturday I had decided to build a sandpit for my 3 little ones to play in. The closest and most convenient place to get pure white sand from was under the grass of the vacant property right next to me. So I neatly removed blocks of grass with my spade (the size of, come to think of it now, a small grave) until the white sand was exposed. I then dug a hole and transferred the sand to the sand pit on my property, replacing the sand with soil I dug up from the sand pit. Just before I started to close the 1.5 meter deep hole however, my 7-year-old son, Luca, jumped into the hole and covered himself with soil. I joined in the fun and continued to throw the rest of the soil on him until only his head stuck out. What we didn’t notice at that point was the shocked faces of a few boys from the neighbourhood passing on their bikes at that very moment…. What they didn’t see of course, was how Luca then wiggled his way out and I closed the hole and replaced the grass patches – very neatly so that no one could see I was there.

These very upset children drove straight home telling the one kid’s mom that a guy with long blonde hair killed a boy with a spade and is busy burying him in a shallow grave, at the vacant property in Brand Street. Initially she brushed them off, but after a sleepless night with hysterical children, she decided to investigate – and discovered the suspicious shallow grave, just as they said. So she phoned the police who came out to the property and suddenly: CRIME SCENE…

Policeman: “So you are the guy with the long blonde hair!”. I (still dressed in my pajama pants) confirmed the size of my son and he shouted to everyone: “Pack up guys, we found the suspect”.

Don’t be surprised if my next wine is called “child killer” or “sandpit”.”