A step up in South African red winemaking

A recent line-up of 47 red wines from South Africa tasted blind for British Airways Club Class was one of the most consistent we tasters for the airline have come across for some time. As I have probably said before, in this exercise I and the BA wine team score the wines in various gradations of alpha, beta and gamma (A, B and C) with alpha wines being really outstanding and gammas faulty in some way.

I gave only one alpha, to the luscious but appetising, almost Merlot-esque Journey's End Cabernet Sauvignon 2001 Stellenbosch imported into the UK by Western...