Chateau Mate #0 Violet Limited Edition 2017

Mildew took half the production and deer another large chunk. In the end was only able to make 54 bottles! RS 6.3 g/l, TA 6 g/l. Unfiltered. Very slightly cloudy. Extraordinary nose – it explodes out the glass, a shower of a hundred different things, like a multi-coloured firework that you can only stand back and gawp at in childish delight. It has the kaleidoscopic acidity of the angles, the colours, the patterns so complex and jewelled, sharp lines forming round shapes, defying anyone to pin it down, shifting the moment you try. I’ll try. Pineapple, red cherries, marigold petals and Turkish delight. Green apples and salty jalapeño and sweetly spiced baked pears. It curves around you, as if it’s soft and kitty-like, and then you poke it and realise that those curves are made of steel. It’s controlled and pulled as tight as a piano wire. But there is a wildness, a defiance. Foot-stomping, campfire-lit, primeval-rhythm hypnotic defiance.