Middlevlei

The urban sprawl of Stellenbosch comes to an abrupt halt, in its south-western suburb of Onderpapegaai, when you enter the gates of Middelvlei. Suddenly, before you lies a beautiful vineyard-strewn amphitheatre overlooking the Bottelary Hills and the upper reaches of Devon Valley. This is the home of the Momberg family, who have been wine farmers since 1919.

Built in 1941, the Middelvlei cellar was extended in 1999 by the addition of a maturation facility for 900 small barrels. Although Tinnie shares his father’s firm belief in traditional winemaking methods, the cellar boasts a combination of both traditional equipment and new technology. New equipment includes a destemmer/crusher that gently removes the stems and crushes the berries to minimize hard tannins in the wine. Another new addition is a mash cooler to cool down the crushed berries before the fermentation process, therefore better preserving the fruit flavours. The wine is fermented in traditional open cement tanks, after which the malolactic fermentation process takes place in closed cement tanks.