Tasha’s folks have a hotel in the Drakensberg mountains called Cleopatra Mountain Farmhouse. They had asked Josh and Tasha to produce a wine specifically for the hotel and restaurant. After putting their heads together for months trying to come up with a name, Tasha’s mother said ‘why don’t we incorporate the copper pot in our logo,’ thus was born ‘Copper Pot’ Pinot Noir. The 2022 bottling continues where the past three vintages left off with the majority of the fruit coming from a couple of vineyards in the Overberg region, where good soils (predominantly clay/shale and quartz/sandstone) and cool growing conditions combine to produce wonderful Pinot Noir that is both rich and perfumed. Adding to this mix are a few small parcels in Elgin, Hemel-en-Aarde and Vrede of Stellenbosch.

The fruit was handpicked and fermented naturally in small, open-top fermenters. Depending on the block and the ripeness of the fruit, John used somewhere between 30-100% whole-clusters bringing a natural structure and savoriness to the wine. Extraction is kept very gentle using a combination of light pumpovers and hand plunging. After 40-45 days on skins, the tanks were pressed to old French barriques and tonneau where they rest for nine months. The wine is bottled unfined, and with just a light filtration and small dose of sulfur.