According to Clarkson Volume 4: How Hard Can it Be?, British funny man and wry social commentator Jeremy Clarkson (better known to petrol heads worldwide as presenter of television motoring show Top Gear) reckons every person is one of just eight personality types: children's author AA Milne's quirky Winnie-the-Pooh characters Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, Kanga, Roo, Owl, Rabbit or Eeyore. If that is the case, then Andries Burger is definitely Tigger.
Vintage 17
Buoyant, bouncy, bubbly, bursting with energy, brimming with enthusiasm, the man fits right into the family who helped pioneer Elgin as one of the Cape's greatest cool-climate terroirs. He's heart and soul into life on the Clüver farm De Rust.
It’s not just as cellarmaster and husband to Inge, one of five children of patriarch Dr Paul Clüver, four of whom are now helping run this mountain estate. It's also a fellow advocator and promoter of the farm’s role in the local community as well as society at large as a source of sustainable growth and development.
Andries Burger is part of the fourth-generation Clüver clan. There's current MD Paul Clüver IV (or 'Paul Junior' as he's affectionately called); Inge, a qualified nurse, who is the financial manager; Karin, production manager in charge of the orchards; and Liesl, who handles the marketing. The families all live in various homes dotted among the rolling green foothills of the Groenlandberg, part of the Hottentots Holland mountain range. So too does Dr Paul Clüver.
Though both this affable man and his energetic wife Songvei are still very much out and about on the estate, they are officially 'retired'. Not that someone with his enquiring mind can probably ever really retire: a neurosurgeon with four medical degrees; an honorary doctorate in agriculture; various local and international directorships in the fruit and wine business; founder of South Africa's first farm worker-owned wine company and the world's first Fairtrade-accredited wine brand (Thandi); and mover and shaker behind the world's first wine and nature biodiversity tourism entity (the Green Mountain Eco Route in Elgin).
The ebullient Andries Burger is a Stellenbosch University B.Sc. viticulture and oenology graduate (class of 1994) and met his wife through her sister, who was in his soil science class. After graduation, he joined the Nederburg cellar team where he was put in charge of red winemaking.
His father-in-law had been collaborating since the early 1980s with then Nederburg MD and viticulturist Ernst le Roux and cellarmaster Newald Marais in testing classic cool-climate varieties such as sauvignon blanc, riesling and Burgundian specialities chardonnay and pinot noir, among others.
The forward-thinking Clüver was keen to explore the commercial potential of quality wine grapes. Although his great-grandfather had bought the farm primarily as summer grazing for his livestock - the Clüvers still run a Hereford stud - he also planted grapes in 1896.
The first Paul Clüver wines were made in Nederburg's experimental cellar in 1990. Although not initially responsible for the vinification of the wines, Andries Burger was already 'involved'. Overseas working stints included experience in Aloxe-Corton - in Burgundy and at Château Margaux in Bordeaux. As winemaking consultant for Nederburg, Margaux's Paul Pontallier had also had input in the Paul Clüver project.
The quality of the farm's grapes was proven by those early bottlings, and Clüver was encouraged to build his own cellar in 1996. He was helped in the design by semi-retired winemaking legend Glinter Brazel, formerly Nederburg cellarmaster for over three decades. And a shoo-in for the position of the winemaker was his talented and enthusiastic young son-in-law.
Grilled kudu fillet with red wine sauce, mashed potatoes and roasted vegetable recipe by Andries Burger paired with Paul Cluver Pinot Noir....
Moules Marinière with home-baked sourdough bread recipe by Andries Burger paired with Paul Cluver Chardonnay....