Middelvlei Wine Estate

Wine creates memories. Memories of fine food, friendship, love and celebrations. Some memories fade with time, like a long African road that disappears over the horizon. Wine memories seem to remain longer - like a long lingering aftertaste of a fine Syrah. Possibly also because no great memory ever starts with a salad.

My wife and I have fond memories of Middelvlei estate. We visited the estate years ago and made friends with their great danes - Tinta and Barocca. We had a wonderful time. Ever since then we have ordered a bottle of Middlevlei wine when celebrating a special occasion. We seem to have built this intangible affiliation with Middelvlei.

At a wine show we met Ben Momberg and of course we started chatting. We were sorry to hear that Tinta and Barocca had sadly passed away. After tasting their superb range of wine Ben asked me if I wanted to make an investment in wine. This is how the deal works: I pay an inflated price for a 5L bottle of wine and he will refill it.

“How often will you refill it?” “Every year - just send me the empty bottle and I will refill it with any wine that you choose.” “Every year?” “Yes - for the rest of your life. This is a good investment.”

For sentimentality more that anything else, we exchanged money, shook hands and left with a big bottle of wine.

What followed was certainly memorable. We had an annual “Momberg challenge”. I would invite family and friends for a meal and attempt to empty the bottle. We ate. We drank good wine. We laughed. We celebrated life. We created good memories. All built around wine.

And things started to slow down. I always needed to call the farm to enquire when the bottle will be filled. Delays were followed by silence. And then more silence.

Now I do have a vague understanding of logistics but I was relying on the integrity of a hand shake with Ben to be true to his word.

I called Ben Momberg and he passed the buck faster than Naas Botha, as a salesperson would do.

I called Tinnie Momberg and his blunt response was: “We don’t do that anymore”.

This review is not about the wine produced at Middelvlei - their wine is excellent. It’s about disappointment and lack of integrity. Crushed memories. A call for businesses to raise their game and meet their promises.

If you ever do a deal with Middelvlei make sure you get it down on paper.