Your Preferences

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The fastest way for us to help you find the wines you'll love (and avoid the wines you won't ) is for you to spend 30 seconds to tell us about your wine tastes. We use these answers, together with your wine ratings to build a detailed profile of your personal tastes. We match your taste profile to our wines taste profile to find the wines that match. Even if it's a grape you don't know, from a place you don't know, made by a person you have never heard of. For example, if you tell us that you like Rioja, we have an Argentinean Malbec that you will adore. And a Spanish Grenache that will blow your socks off.

I prefer

I usually spend about:

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I buy about bottles a week

Red wine preferences

Do you like? Rating (rollover the stars to rate)
Big, full bodied red wines? The kind of wine that goes with a rich meaty stew? E.g. Aussie Shiraz.
Elegant restrained reds...e.g. Bordeaux and Burgundy.
Rioja? Warm, oaky mellow wines, great for sharing around a roaring fire?
Soft, fruity, juicy easy drinking reds. e.g. Chilean Merlot, or a Cote du Rhone?

White wine preferences

Do you like? Rating (rollover the stars to rate)
New Zealand Sauvignons and other fruity, refreshingly zingy whites?
Oaky, mellow fruity wines? Australian Chardonnay for example?
Fruity but DRY whites, perfect for an aperitif
Bone dry classics like Chablis?

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Your Browsing History

The Naked Facts
  • Granite soils, blistering hot dry summers and freezing rainy winters means that Matthew can produce Shiraz to rival any from Rhone
  • The luckiest winemaker on the planet, he's backed by people who have the money and the time to let him make wines as good as they can possibly be
  • Matthew learnt his trade at the Cape's most prestigious wineries

Matthew Copeland Subscribe to Matthew Copeland's RSS Feed

Get in on the ground floor...great winemaker, cracking estate, about to take off

Popularity

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333 Ratings 3 Stars
Matthew Copeland

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Francesca Jacklin

Hi Matthew, we held a South African wine tasting for our local village wine club on 20th Jan and I must say your Petit Blanc with it's unusual blend went down a storm, it even got a mention in our local village newsletter !! We hold our tastings once a month so I'm sure we'll get to try many more of your wines throughout the year.
Best Regards Francesca

by Francesca 31/01/2010 12:30

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Matthew Copeland

Hello Winter People! Yesterday we had a wopping hot summer day. It was in fact 45 degress celcius in the shade. Can you believe it?! It was rather a shock to the system as we've enjoyed a very temperate summer thus far. Fortunately yesterday was a bit of a freak occurance and today is only going to be in the mid twenties.

After a brief holiday by the see, it's been all hands on deck for the last two weeks. We are of course preparing ourselves for the harvest. All the equipment needs to be serviced, all my dry goods need to be ordered and I need to get my Babiana, Chardonnay, Erica and Cab/Merlot in the bottle.

Once that's done it's head down and flat out for the next couple of months. The grapes look good although I will have to be careful of blocks that have irregular ripening. This is a result of our cool and wet spring. Right now I'm of to the vineyards with our MD, Julian Johnsen, to do our final block analysis. I will keep you posted.

Enjoy the wine and all the best for 2010. Take care. Matthew Copeland

by Matthew 14/01/2010 05:35

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Ben Drury

The Baldrick is superb! Definitely a cunning plan that worked!

by Ben 08/12/2009 11:38

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Matthew Copeland

I believe we have an emerging favourite! Baldrick is certainly putting a smile on everyone's face. Wine needn't be serious and I wanted people to be able to laugh a little and have some fun. Thanks to everyone who likes the wine. There's no better compliment than you enjoying my wine!

Summer is finally here with Vondeling escaping the bad weather disease free. I'm hoping that the cold spring and temperate start to summer will have a positive effect on the grapes. If these temperaturse continue they will extend the grape's hang time and allow for more intense flavour development. However I'm only hoping at this point and will only be able to tell in early January.

This week I start the final evaluation of my wines so that I can allocate them to the various blends. The wines are scheduled for bottling in Jan next year.

by Matthew 01/12/2009 08:31

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Matthew's Story

"I was born in Paarl, smack bang in the centre of the South African Winelands and as such I was literally surrounded by wine as a kid. After finishing school I had fun working with wine bottling and marketing, but I was always drawn to the art of winemaking and knew it was the career for me

Wine, woman and song lead me to follow an apprenticeship in biological winemaking and farming in Geneva, Switzerland. I worked in the Northern Hemisphere, the Southern Hemisphere, I made big Shiraz Blends in the South of France and some lovely Chardonnay and Pinot Noir in Sonoma, California. I also spent some time in the Barossa Valley and South Australia.

These endless summer travels were great times and a massive learning curve for me but my practical knowledge seriously outweighed my academic knowledge so I duly completed a winemaking degree.

Trying in vain to cure the travelling bug in my system I went to New Zealand to observe their Sauvignon production before returning to South Africa. Here I was appointed senior winemaker to Welbedacht, my practical knowledge certainly came in handy as my first job was to design and build the cellar myself!

I have been with Vondeling for the last two and half years and I am searching for the almost perfect wine. A tiny flaw in a wine serves as the window through which we view all the other salient features of the wine. Alternatively, to quote Leonard Cohen: 'It’s the cracks that let the light through'

Let the wine be your master. Scientifically I prefer to be minimalistic. I prefer to judge and interpret the flow of the wine. Chemical analyses are momentary and often confuse your decisions. You should have a relationship with the wine so that you can interpret its needs and desires. I love the fact that winemaking is a complete process. It begins with the earth, flows through the seasons and enters the lives and thoughts of people. It links me to the earth and to it's people at the same time."

Vondeling Erica Shiraz 2006
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Vondeling Erica Shiraz 2006

Overall Rating: 3.5 Stars

  • Only the finest grapes, selected from the best performing vines are chosen for this Vondeling masterpiece
  • Aged in French oak barrels for a rich and wonderfully smokey savoury finish
  • One of six impeccable Vondeling wines produced by our gold medal wining winemaker, Matthew Copeland
Vondeling Chardonnay 2008
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Vondeling Chardonnay 2008

Overall Rating: 3 Stars

  • Made from hand picked grapes this wine will challenge Burgundies at double the price
  • One of six mouth watering wines from the accomplished gold medal wining winemaker, Matthew Copeland
  • This is a seriously classy wine at a bargain price point, the integrated oak is very smooth and wonderfully creamy
Vondeling Babiana 2006
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Vondeling Babiana 2006

Overall Rating: 3 Stars

  • Awarded a gold medal and a special trophy as the ‘Best Kept Secret’ at the Swiss Air International Wine Awards 2008
  • This Chenin, Chardonnay, Viognier described by Jancis Robinson as a "seriously interesting blend with a much longer life than many South African wines. Very well made" JR enthuses over Cape wine 5th November 2009
  • Winemaker tip - Enjoy with grilled fish, creamy Thai dishes or chicken flambé pasta, followed by soft Italian cheeses
Vondeling Petit Blanc 2008
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Vondeling Petit Blanc 2008

Overall Rating: 3 Stars

  • Produced in the stunning Paarl region in the Western Cape of South Africa, this is one of 6 mouth watering wines from the Vondeling range
  • A complex and intriguing unwooded white blend from our gold medal wining winemaker, Matthew Copeland
  • Winemaker tip- try it on a lazy summer afternoon with tomato and avocado salad, some grilled Camembert, lots of cured meats and biscuits....exquisite
Vondeling Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot 2005
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Vondeling Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot 2005

Overall Rating: 3.5 Stars

  • A cracking example of a new world take on Bordeaux, bags more fruit and wine for your money!
  • A classic blend with an abundant array of fruit flavours which will keep you going back for the next glass
  • Try it South African style with a well-matured, thickly sliced slab of sirloin, served rare off a hot bed of coals