MICHAEL FRIDJHON: You do not have to pay a premium to enjoy a good glass of wine
The ability to buy wines of exceptional value at a good price often means that we undervalue them
The tsunami of ultra-premium wine releases has (hopefully) run its course. Seen as if from space, it’s no bigger than a ripple running the length and breadth of an ocean of vastly more affordable wine enjoyed by enthusiasts daily. Even if you’re a PPE kingpin there’s only so much “fine, rare and unobtainable” wine you can drink before your body shouts out for something which is simply savoury and delicious.
In this respect South Africans are spoilt for choice: from the online and specialist retailers we can source the Cape’s vinous collectibles — and enjoy a far greater chance of success than Americans trying to secure a bottle of Harlan or Screaming Eagle at the time of release. But we can also buy wines of such exceptional value that we undervalue them, victims of the price-as-quality-proxy logic that fools many people into assuming that if it’s expensive it must be good, and if it’s inexpensive it must be junk...
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