Photo by Michael Botner
Maverick's owner and winemaker Bertus Albertyn
Small wineries are the heart and soul of the BC wine industry. The story of Maverick Estate demonstrates how one such winery navigates the gauntlet of challenges to establish a rising reputation for unique, distinctive wines.
The origin of Maverick dates back to 1990 when Schalk de Witt, a medical graduate from the University of Stellenbosch, immigrated from South Africa. Driving through the Okanagan to his first posting in the Kootenays, he found the semi-arid climate and sage brush of the South Okanagan reminded him of home in the Eastern Cape. The next chapter plays out in South Africa where de Witt’s daughter, Elzaan, reconnected with and then married Bertus Albertyn, a childhood friend. Coincidentally, they both studied at the University of Stellenbosch. While Elzaan followed in her father’s footsteps earning a medical degree, Albertyn obtained a degree in viticulture and enology. After working at a giant wine co-operative in South Africa, he joined family-owned Avondale in Paarl.
Fast forward to 2009 when De Witt, nearing retirement, and his wife Lynn Safroniuk, purchased a former organic farm on the western slope of the South Okanagan Valley beside Highway 97, later to become Maverick. It was his second acquisition, the first being a 48-acre parcel of raw land neighbouring the Osoyoos Larose vineyard in 2005. It was also the year Bertus and Elzaan moved to the South Okanagan, where Elzaan opened a medical practice and Bertus took on the winemaking duties at Burrowing Owl.
After clearing the farm, the family planted 7½ acres of vines in 2011. Using his training and work as a vineyard manager, Albertyn selected a limited number of varieties including Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Gris, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Syrah. By 2014, Maverick opened its new cellar door, a clean, modern version of an old Cape Dutch farmhouse designed by architect Robert Mackenzie. Leaving Burrowing Owl in 2013 enabled Albertyn to concentrate on grape growing and winemaking at Maverick.
Technically just south of the “three terraces associated alluvial fans on the slopes of Mount Kobau between Tinhorn and Testalinden Creeks” that delineates the limits of the Golden Mile Bench, Maverick’s vineyard is ideal for growing cooler climate varieties, such as Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, as well as sinewy reds like Syrah. Split into one-acre lots, soils consist of well-drained, brown, stony, gravelly, glacio-fluvial deposits, with the lower section having a higher concentration of finely-textured sediment and silt.
The southeast-facing vineyard catches good early morning and afternoon sun. Cool evenings slow ripening, encouraging the development of complexity and intense flavours.
How important is Maverick’s site and specific soils therein? “These factors are critical to the making of good wine,” Albertyn says. “My job is to grow grapes with good flavour concentration and then to preserve the quality of the berries in the bottle. Without good fruit, you cannot make good wine, although it is possible to make bad wine from good grapes.”
Keeping soils alive through manuring and covering crops in the vineyard are key practices Albertyn uses to optimize both production and quality. Adding nutrients and beneficial microbes to the soil results in a bigger root system for vines and more interaction with the soil. “It allows the plants to pull out more minerals from the soil while achieving our production goal of 100 kilograms per vine,” he explains.
“Intervene as little as possible,” Albertyn says about his grape growing style. “Use no more irrigation, fertilizers and chemicals than is necessary to keep the plant system in balance with the environment.“ Look at the vigour of the plant and make adjustments,” he says. “It gets to the point where colouring stops and plants ripen naturally – concentrating everything in the bunches – on their own.”
The time of picking is “unbelievably important,” he says. “I taste the berries and visualize the end-product before deciding when to pick the grapes,” he says. “If you are mentally trying to make a wine and pick a week late, you can’t make that wine.”
The operation gets easier after a few harvests. “When you get to know the vineyard, you start picking up flavour components associated with the wine you want to make.”
Albertyn is even less interventionist when it comes to the winemaking operation.
“My aim is to make wines that have a more graceful, Old World structure,” he says. Bunches are harvested into small, 30 pound trays, gently hand-sorted and cooled to preserve fruit and purity before processing. Fermentation of wine is strictly wild and natural from start to finish.
“As difficult as this is, the best way for a winemaker with a science background to learn is to just not do anything,” he says. “Then you do not have to do anything unless something goes wrong. The emphasis is on doing more to make sure nothing goes wrong.”
In Albertyn’s experience, white wine is more difficult to make than reds. With whites, “shelf life is limited and you have to sell it within 6 months,” he says. “Not only do you have to know what you want to do, but you have to make it correctly the first time. With reds, you have more leeway to rectify small mistakes.”
Production is small at Maverick, no more than 6,000 cases, and includes a small but varied line-up of handcrafted wines that combine concentrated, boldly assertive fruit with elegant, nuanced flavour complexity. ■
