Kanenkop Kadette Cape Blend
£18.99
£25.32 per litre · incl. 20% VAT
Only 4 bottles left
90Tim Atkin MW
Want to understand what a Cape Blend actually is? Start here. This is Kanonkop's everyday star: Pinotage-led, silky, and bursting with raspberry, dark cherry and a whisper of spice. Polished enough to impress, gentle enough to open on a Tuesday. From one of Stellenbosch's most respected estates, delivered to your door anywhere in the UK.
Not for sale to persons under 18. Adult signature required on delivery.
Our Verdict
We taste a lot of sub-twenty-pound Stellenbosch reds, and the Kadette is the one we keep recommending without hesitation. It carries the Kanonkop fingerprint, that streamlined, dark-fruited elegance, at a price that feels almost generous, and Tim Atkin MW gave it 90 points. What surprises people is the polish: the tannins are silkier and more approachable than you'd expect from a Pinotage-led blend, which makes it a perfect gateway into the Cape Blend style. Ideal for anyone who wants genuine pedigree on a weeknight. We're down to our last few bottles, and it rarely sits on the shelf for long.
Tasting Notes
Crimson in the glass, with a lifted nose of raspberry, dark cherry and black plum threaded through warm cinnamon and allspice. That spice is the giveaway of a Cape Blend built around Pinotage, and it carries through to a palate of juicy red and black fruit. The tannins are supple and fine-grained rather than grippy, so it feels approachable straight away, while fresh acidity keeps everything bright. A whisper of chocolate rounds out a finish that genuinely lingers.
About This Wine
Here's a wine that punches well above its price, and once you've poured it you'll wonder why you ever spent more. The Kadette is Kanonkop's Cape Blend, a style South Africa can genuinely call its own: Pinotage at the heart, fleshed out with classic Bordeaux varieties for structure and polish. The result is unmistakably Stellenbosch and unmistakably good. Expect crimson depth in the glass and a nose that pulls you straight in: ripe raspberry, dark cherry and black plum, lifted by cinnamon and a dusting of sweet baking spice. The palate is where it really earns its keep. Supple, elegant tannins, fresh acidity holding everything in line, and a generous flow of red and black fruit with a hint of dark chocolate on the finish. Twelve months in seasoned French oak adds warmth and frame without ever stealing the show. Kanonkop sits on the lower slopes of the Simonsberg, where cool ocean breezes slow the ripening and keep these wines balanced rather than blowsy. You taste that restraint here. It's a brilliant all-rounder at the table: wood-fired pizza, a Sunday roast chicken, lamb burgers off the barbecue, or a slow beef stew on a cold evening. A reliably impressive gift too, for an expat missing the Cape or anyone who loves a serious red. UK-wide delivery, usually within a few days.
Food Pairing
This is a wine that loves the table at its most relaxed. Pour it with a wood-fired pizza, a rich beef ragu over pasta, or anything off the barbecue while the British summer holds. The supple tannins and bright fruit also handle a herby roast chicken or a thick beef and lamb burger with ease, and a slow-simmered beef stew on a cold evening is a natural match.
- —Wood-fired margherita or pepperoni pizza
- —Beef ragu with pappardelle
- —Barbecued lamb chops with rosemary
- —Herb-roasted chicken with roast potatoes
- —Slow-cooked beef and red wine stew
How to Serve
Decanting
Not essential given the supple tannins, but half an hour in a decanter lifts the raspberry and spice aromatics and rounds out the mid-palate nicely.
Behind the Wine
On the lower slopes of the Simonsberg, warm Cape days are tempered by cool ocean breezes that drift inland each afternoon. That swing between heat and chill slows ripening and locks in natural acidity, so the fruit comes in balanced rather than baked. In cooler seasons the tannins arrive softer and more supple, which is exactly what you taste here: a red with elegance and freshness rather than weight, drinkable young while still keeping a savoury Stellenbosch backbone.
Ageing Potential
Built to drink now thanks to its softer tannin structure, but it will hold and gently evolve over the next five to seven years. Expect the bright fruit to deepen into something more savoury and the spice to mellow if you give it a little patience.
The Land
The vineyards sit on decomposed granite soils on the Simonsberg's lower slopes. Granite drains freely and makes the vines work, which builds mid-palate depth and a dark-fruited core, while the slope and mountain aspect catch cooling air. The result is streamlined, even tannins and a wine with both presence and poise.
The Winemaking
There is nothing flashy about how this is made, just patience and good judgement. Fermentation happens in open-top concrete tanks, with the cap of skins punched down by hand every couple of hours to coax out colour and gentle structure rather than hard tannin. The juice comes off the skins after a few days, then settles through malolactic fermentation before twelve months in second and third-fill 225-litre French Nevers oak. Older barrels season the wine quietly, framing the fruit instead of smothering it in vanilla.
About the Producer
Kanonkop
Ask anyone who's spent time in South African wine circles which estate defines Stellenbosch reds, and Kanonkop comes up before you've finished the question. Tucked on the lower slopes of the Simonsberg mountain, this is a producer that has never chased fashion. Instead, it has spent decades perfecting two things: old-vine Pinotage and Bordeaux-style blends built to age.
What makes Kanonkop worth your attention is its refusal to modernise for modernising's sake. The red wines are still fermented in open concrete kuipe, with cellar hands physically punching down the cap by hand rather than relying on mechanical pumps. It's labour-intensive, slower, and exactly why the wines carry such depth and structure. Some of the Pinotage vines here are bush-trained and over fifty years old, planted long before the grape earned any international respect.
Winemaker Abrie Beeslaar has led the cellar since 2002, taking over from Beyers Truter, the man widely credited with putting South African Pinotage on the world map. Beeslaar has more than kept pace, picking up the International Winemaker of the Year title at the IWSC three times, a rare feat for anyone, anywhere. The estate remains a family business, run today by brothers Johann and Paul Krige, whose family has owned this land since 1929.
We stock Kanonkop because it answers a question UK customers often ask us: what does serious South African wine actually taste like? The Kadette range, the estate's second label, gives newcomers an honest, accessible route into that answer, built on the same philosophy and fruit sourcing as the flagship wines, just at a friendlier price point. If you want to understand why critics call this a First Growth of the Cape, starting here makes complete sense. Delivered across the UK, it's as close as you'll get to Simonsberg without a plane ticket.