Why it matters
The producer
Bruwer Raats founded the estate to work specifically with Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc, two grapes that remain its principal materials. Gavin Bruwer Slabbert joined the family business in 2010, while Bruwer’s sons Samuel and Joshua have taken roles in vineyards and cellar work, and marketing respectively. The family structure reaches the bottles through work divided between growing grapes, making wine and bringing it to market.
MR de Compostella adds another name to that work. It is a collaboration between Bruwer Raats and winemaker Mzokona Mvemve, made as a separate red-blend project rather than as a renamed Cabernet Franc.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
Polkadraai lies in the Stellenbosch area, and Raats works both there and in surrounding Stellenbosch vineyard sites. That wider sourcing matters because the range is built from two grapes rather than one estate parcel: Chenin Blanc is the main planting, with Cabernet Franc the smaller but defining red component.
Independent regional material reports roughly 25 hectares and annual production of just over 10,000 twelve-bottle cases. It also places plantings at about 80% Chenin Blanc and 20% Cabernet Franc, a balance that explains why the white wine has a central place while the reds concentrate on a smaller set of named bottles.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
Raats’s vineyard material includes dry-farmed parcels and sites on granite and sandstone. In the glass, that work is most useful when read through structure: Chenin Blanc can hold acidity and fruit weight together, while Cabernet Franc can carry tannin, savoury notes and floral lift without relying on overt oak character.
The cellar approach changes with the bottle. Dolomite Cabernet Franc is matured in neutral oak, so the barrel is intended to support texture and tannin rather than cover the grape with new-oak flavour. Jasper Red Blend has its own barrel regime, while MR de Compostella is assembled from components judged in a blind tasting; any component scoring below 90 is left out of the final blend.
Wines to know
The range in view
Old Vine Chenin Blanc 2024 is the white anchor: a current-vintage Chenin Blanc with its own élevage and ageing guidance. Its role is not to imitate the red wines’ tannin and barrel shape, but to show Chenin Blanc as a white wine with fruit, acidity, texture and a finish that can carry development in bottle.
Dolomite Cabernet Franc is the direct red-variety bottle. Neutral-oak maturation keeps Cabernet Franc’s fruit, floral and savoury side in view, while its tannin gives the wine a firmer frame than the Chenin Blanc. The supplied Dolomite product reference carries a vintage discrepancy, so the bottle should be checked for its current vintage at purchase.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
Start with Raats Old Vine Chenin Blanc 2024. It puts the estate’s founding white grape first, rather than asking a first encounter to decode a red blend. Expect fruit and citrus notes, acidity through the palate, a fuller Chenin Blanc texture and a finish with enough shape for ageing. It connects the Polkadraai-based estate, the producer’s Chenin Blanc focus and a named current bottle in one glass.