This is a South African wine for $14 that was a wine club selection in June; I opened it this week with Moroccan chicken. (Well, actually I did not use the chicken to open the wine, I used a corkscrew, but I did consume both in close proximity.
Well, no, I didn't consume the corkscrew. I had the wine and chicken. At the same meal.
Anyway, the chicken was prepared with oregano, allspice, cumin, cloves, garlic, and olive oil, so had a dark, earthy flavor.
With a deep purple color, the wine had a mild sharpness to the nose, followed by smoke. It deepened over time. It had a thick, soft mouthfeel and the predominant flavor was smoke. Woodsmoke, burnt/charred softwood, with some notes of resin. It was an interesting deep earthy flavor that complemented the chicken very nicely.
Later in the week I had it with a tomato based vegetable and ground turkey stew (some of this wine was added to the stew), and while it was nice, it didn't quite have the synergy it brought to the chicken dish.
Like the Tenuta Rapitala Casalj, I find this to be quite interesting; not a wine I might match casually, but one that has a definite niche. (try the Casalj with anchovy mustard asparagus pasta!).
I had had the Spier before; at that time I noted "deep soft nose, spicy in front, soft mouthfeel, slightly astringent, watery finish, smoke". This time there was no watery finish, and the smoke was quite prominent.
Jose