Ken Forrester, Stellenbosch (South Africa) Chenin Blanc 2016

 Ken Forrester’s “Old Vine” bottling of Chenin is so good that you may find it difficult to pony up for this much more costly wine.  However, there’s also a cost to failing to try it, namely, the cost of missing a chance to taste how astonishingly complex and complete South Africa’s best renderings of Chenin can be.  Made from 46 year-old, dry-farmed bush vines, this shows very impressive concentration but also commensurately assertive acidity.  Forrester noted to me that his objective is to make, “The biggest possible wine with the most restraint,” and though this objective can seem internally inconsistent, the wine demonstrates convincingly that it is not.  The fruit component is so extravagantly rich and luxurious that my raw tasting note includes the descriptors, “peach marmalade” and “lemon curd,” yet the citrus component that focuses the mid-palate and drives the finish is to energetic that my note also reads, “almost stinging.”  This is a supremely exciting wine that is already spectacular, but is sure to improve for another decade.  Yikes!