Hello. You’ve probably landed here because you are enjoying a glass of something delicious from the Hampton Manor cellar.  Below you’ll discover the story of one of our favourite wines to kick off an experience at the house. This wine to helps you get under the skin of what natural wine is all about and to points to the wider ethos of our cellar.

I wish I was a Ninja | Testalonga El Bandito Wines

Made by | Craig Hawkins… a pioneering South African wine make.

In | Swartland, South Africa… historically not well known for wine making… increasingly THE place to make wine.

With | Colombard, old vines… A grape variety typically used in southern France to make Cognac.

How | The ancestral method

Wine is “made from Grapes”. Simple! You’ll find that saying on every one of Craig’s bottles. Sounds a bit elementary? The irony is most of the wines we see on the supermarket shelves are no longer just made from grapes. They are packed with other things and so our friend names it “coca-cola” juice.  Craig is one of the many people fighting to put real wine back on our tables.

Great fruit relies on great farming. Farming that nurtures the natural life and diversity of the vineyard. In this case the vines have been farmed organically since they were planted in 1998, one of many approaches moving our land back to being a living ecosystem.

When we farm without chemicals and pesticides we protect the billions of micro organism in the soil but also the huge yeast pollutions that occur naturally on the skins of the grapes in the vineyard. It is these yeasts that feed on the sugars in the grape juice once it has been crushed and transform them into wine. This process is called wild fermentation.

Most industrially farmed vineyards can’t ferment a wine naturally/wildly but require yeast to be cultured in labs and imported into the process. This is because chemicals and pesticides used to manage pests and disease devastate the hidden microbial life in a natural ecosystem. No one is to blame. Farmers were told to crack on to try and feed the world and these methods seemed a good idea… only now are we realising we need to work with nature rather than trying to dominate it.

Craig’s colombard vines produce low yields of quality fruit that is hand harvested and then fermented using the yeast occurring naturally in the vineyard. This wine is bottled before the fermentation is complete allowing the wine to develop a build up of C02 in the bottle creating a naturally sparkling wine (Pet Nat). Once the bottle is capped this process is left to itself. Normally in a wine made like this you have some sugars left  that have not been converted into alcohol and this leaves it tasting slightly sweet or what wine geeks call “off-dry”.

This method is the oldest way of making sparkling wine and is known as the Ancestral Method. We like this nod to the ancient ways as so much of the good farming emerging across the world is looking back to before the industrial age to work out how we restore our farmland and ecosystems to the healthy, resilient and diverse state they were once in. To go forward we look back.

Most wines have the addition of sulphur in during the fermentation or when bottling to stabilise them but this wine has none added. The natural wine makers are known to say “nothing added, nothing taken away” but still sulphur is common even amongst natural wine makers to protect the wine from spoiling during shipping and storage.

So in summary we’ve chosen Ninja because it really captures the spirit of the natural wine movement:

1) Naturally farmed and hand harvested

2) Naturally fermented with wild yeast

3) Nothing added not even sulphur on bottling.

4) Nothing taken away – this wine is not filtered or fined (they do naturally remove the sediment by racking the wine which is process of letting it settle and then moving it to a new vessel).

Because nothing is added or taken away in the winery, winemakers often call natural wine making “minimal intervention” or hands off wine making. Some natural winemakers take offence at these terms as there is still so much love, time and care required to get a wine from the vineyard into your glass. In simplest terms we like to say… ‘not messed about with’. Both in our cooking and on our wine list we want to be known for relying on quality ingredients that are not messed about with but respected and sensitively handled to show them at their best.

Many of the wines on our wine lists will come from organic and sometimes biodynamic vineyards, as does much of the produce on the menu in Grace & Savour. Many of our smaller growers can’t afford these certifications but are deeply committed to a responsible and sustainable way of farming. When we choose things to champion at the manor where possible we look for good people committed to good farming. The journey back to healthy farming and a healthy planet is a long and complex one and there are no quick fixes, right answers or complete solutions. We’re part of the conversation but certainly haven’t ticked all the boxes.  Hopefully though, we’ve created a place and a community that is asking good questions and is intent on moving in the right direction.

Most of all though the Ninja reminds us people drink wine to have fun and feel good. Craig is certainly doing that in the pool. So sip up and call the bar man back… its time to enjoy yourself.

Written by: James Hill, Founder & MD at Hampton Manor.