The Wines of Zimbabwe

 Let's go to another largely unexplored wine region -- Zimbabwe. Once known as Rhodesia and named after Cecil Rhodes of Rhodes Scholarship fame. The country was one of the homes of apartheid where the minority Whites were legally considered superior and they were segregated from the native and majority Blacks of the area except when using them for slave labor. The uprising of the very late 1970s and in to 1980, however, led to the establishment of the independent nation of Zimbabwe. For the first 37 years, it was led by the authoritarian regime of Robert Mugabe. Since his resignation under pressure, i.e. arrest, in 2017, the country has been led by fairly elected officials as it moves toward  being a Democratic state.

It's a picturesque country known to tourists for its widlife preserves and for Victoria Falls. While not the highest waterfall in the world (that honor goes to Angel Falls in Venezuela), it's thought to be the largest as it forms a natural divide between the northwest corner of Zimbabwe and neighboring Zambia.

Wine grapes were introduced to the country by Rhodes and his ilk. Under Mugabe's reign, however, they largely disappeared and the country was left with just a few wineries in the noerheast part of the country not far from the border with Mozambique.

The grapes here are a combination of cuttings brought to the territory by Rhodes (so, European grapes) and from cuttings from Stellenbosch and Western Cape in South Africa. As none of the grapes are known for their exceptional quality, most of the wines produced are blends.

The local grapes that you can find are Merlot, Alicante Bouschet, Syrah/Shiraz, and Cabernet Sauvignon among the ones that produce red wines and Semillon, Sauvignon Blanc, Moscatel, and Perel (an Israeli grape whose cuttings came from some of the Jewish settlements in South Africa).

Here's the good news. A really expensive bottle of wine from Zimbabwe will not break the bank. Look to pay $6 or $7 per bottle for those labeled reserve and about $4 otherwise. Wine reviewers say they are drinkable, especially when they are all that is available, but perhaps only drinkable because there is nothing else there for comparison.


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