Rust en Vrede Tasting Room: Winemaker’s Lunch + Award-Winning Reds

Rust En Vrede Wine Tasting Cellar

Focused, fabulous and simply delicious.

With its heritage Cape Dutch buildings and glorious views from the slopes of the Helderberg, Rust en Vrede is one of Stellenbosch’s finest, known far and wide for some of the best cabernet sauvignons and syrahs in the land.

Surrounded by beautiful gardens, with fragrant rose bushes and towering oaks, the warm and welcoming Tasting Room is the ideal spot for a relaxed day out with friends and family.

Rust En Vrede Wine Tasting Fireplace

While the estate’s celebrated fine-dining restaurant in the adjacent building offers a more formal evening experience, the Tasting Room is ideal for a laidback country lunch accompanied by some exceptional, full-bodied red wines.

Wine-tasting at Rust en Vrede

Rust En Vrede Wine Tasting Booth

In winter, the Tasting Room is warm and cosy, thanks to two fireplaces, making it the perfect spot to huddle with a glass of red, and admire the views through large windows of the very vineyards in which the wines start their journey.

For full immersion, visitors can also sit alongside the working wine cellar, or down in the cosy, candle-lit underground maturation cellar, surrounded by bottles of wine in the making. If the sun’s out, the terrace under the oaks is where visitors gravitate.

Apart from the superb wines, Rust en Vrede’s new arrival is just in time for winter – a potstill brandy 12 years in the making.

Your tasting options:

  • Estate Tasting The Vineyards Syrah, Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon and Estate Red Blend (R120; free for Wine Club members)
  • Estate 2020 The latest vintage of Rust en Vrede’s flagship red blend (R40)
  • Estate 2013 The 10-year-old vintage of the flagship red blend (R100)
  • Estate 12YO Potstill Brandy The new addition to the portfolio (R90)

Winemaker’s Lunch

Rust En Vrede Winemakers Lunch

After sampling the wines, settle in for the Winemaker’s Lunch, served in the Tasting Room (or on the terrace, weather permitting). Simple and utterly delicious, there is an easy choice of just three mains (each R350), which all come with a glass of perfectly paired wine:

  • Chalmar sirloin steak, with fries, salad and Rust en Vrede Estate red blend
  • Norwegian salmon, with baby potatoes, seasonal greens and Donkiesbaai Steen (chenin blanc) or Grenache Noir
  • Chalmar pepper-crusted fillet, with fries, salad and the Estate Vineyards Syrah

There is also a list of wines by the glass, should you want a top-up or to try something else with your meal – such as the cabernet sauvignon – or order a bottle of the Single Vineyard reds. The Estate Potstill Brandy makes the perfect after-meal digestif, savoured beside the fire.

Befitting the keep-it-simple philosophy of the overall experience, there are no reservations required. Just pop in and enjoy a perfectly sublime Winelands interlude.
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Opening times Monday – Saturday, 9am – 5pm
Sunday, 10am – 4pm
Winemaker’s Lunch: 12pm – 3pm
Cost Wine-tasting: R40 – R120
Winemaker’s Lunch: From R350
Contact 021 881 3881, tastingroom@rustenvrede.com
Where to find it Annandale Road, Stellenbosch

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Disclaimer:

The Inside Guide has made every effort to ensure that the information in this post was correct at the time of publication. However, we do not assume any liability caused by errors, such as price, cost, time, and location.

Time of publication: 23 May 2023