Celebrate 21 years of Creation Wines with one of their sensorial food and wine pairings

As far as celebrations go, a 21-year anniversary is a special one. In the world of wine, it could be seen as a milestone for a relatively young vineyard — one that is perhaps still finding its feet. But a description of this nature would be doing a disservice to Creation Wines, the award-winning vineyard in the Hemel-en-Aarde Valley.

When Swiss-born winemaker Jean-Claude Martin and his South African wife Carolyn started Creation in 2002, they did so on a blank canvas, so to speak.

Joining Carolyn in the Creation Tasting Room restaurant recently, she explained that the biggest challenge they faced when they started was the total lack of infrastructure: a gravel road for 11km, no buildings or water purification systems and not a vine in sight.

Twenty-one years later, they have become renowned for their superb chardonnays and pinot noirs — the list of accolades, many of which adorn the walls of the tasting room, being too long to list.

Last year Creation received the 2021 Great Wine Capitals Best of Wine Tourism Award for Innovative Wine Tourism. They have been ranked as the number one vineyard in Africa according to the World’s 50 Best Vineyards, have been in the top 50 twice and made the top ten in 2021.

The Martins’ passion is almost palpable, from Creation’s fine wines through to the experimental and sensorial food and wine pairings for which the wine farm has come to be loved. And they’re driven by the constant desire to innovate which is playing out in Creation’s collaboration with scientists and experts in their fields — from attaining virus-free vines to using science to reveal nature and elevate the tasting experience of wine and food.

The most recent foray into elevating the tasting experience was during a celebratory event in Creation’s Tasting Room last month at which French neuroscientist Gabriel Lepousez presented some of his ideas of bringing the delicious and savoury tastes of umami into food and wine.

And when you’re presented with Creation’s summer menu, named Breathe, it’s difficult not to be spectacularly blown away.

To start, there’s a taste of the Creation Viognier, soon followed by the first chapter: Creation sauvignon blanc which is paired with three utterly delicious mouthfuls of a mojito booster, yellow tomato gazpacho shot and a deceivingly simple description of “lettuce canapé” that explodes with flavour.

The next chapter, “Ocean’s Gift”, features a bite-sized salmon trout taco, and is presented with a glistening periwinkle shell. The idea is to have a sip of sauvignon blanc, listen to the ocean sounds lapping from the shell, and then taste the wine again.

What follows are sips of Creation’s Reserve chardonnay interspersed with bites of chicken wing lollipops, moreish turmeric hummus, confit baby potatoes and the crispiest flakes of kale; a beautifully blush rosé flits with a rich yet light tuna, avocado and edamame poke bowl with flavours of daikon, teriyaki and lime; and the velvety notes of Creation’s Reserve pinot noir marry seamlessly with morsels of succulent springbok, wild mushroom and kohlrabi.