STELLAKAYA buys the grapes to make its wines. At harvest time, Biyela visits suppliers' vineyards to make sure the fruit is ready for harvest, then supervises the destalking, sorting, crushing and cold soaking of the grapes with their skins to extract the color and flavor.
Next, the grapes are stomped: In times past, this was done by human feet, but in this small winery they use wooden blocks attached to sticks. The smell at this stage is of sweet grape juice, without the heady bouquet that will come later.
Biyela has to "inoculate" the wine with the correct dose of yeast to start fermentation, turning sugar into alcohol. She measures the sugar level to check the speed of fermentation before the wine goes into a basket press and into barrels for a second fermentation in which bacteria is added.
Weeks or months pass before the wine is "racked" -- removed from the lees, or sediment -- and placed into clean barrels, with other additions.
Biyela's favorite moment is blending: All the different wines that have been made are tasted, and she blends them to produce a particular wine.
"There is more art involved in blending," she said. "You are tasting the wine and you are trying to put different components with different characters together. You want them to be harmonious. It's hard work. But it's also fun."
Last year, Lello sent Biyela to Saint-Emilion, the famous winemaking area of Bordeaux, France. There were more adventures for her palate, but she came back with her belief in the quality of South African wines affirmed.
"Yes, they make good wines. But I believe in our South African wines," she said.
One of Biyela's fans is Philippe Wagenfuhrer, a French chef at Roots restaurant, near Johannesburg, who believes her wines have grown in elegance and style as she has gained confidence and independence as a winemaker.
"Hercules was different," he said of the silver-medal Sangiovese blend. "Hercules was the wine that stood out of the whole range. It's the one that was my favorite. It's soft yet complex. You can tell it's made by a woman. It's a wine with elegance and finesse.
"When you give freedom to passion and freedom to people who know what they want to do, they excel themselves," he said. "She's now getting big comments on the quality of the wine and she's really doing very well."
Sometimes at night, Biyela lies in bed thinking of her wines in their barrels of French oak in the cellar. She worries whether they are all right and thinks of them as her "babies" tucked in for the night. She dreams of one day having her own vineyard and cellar.
"I want someone to taste the wine and say, 'I love this.' That makes me feel good, because I made it."
Now when she goes back to Kwavuthela village, her mother, proud of Biyela's achievements, pulls out a bottle of wine and pours out glasses.
As they drink, Biyela catches in her mother's face a glimpse of the same incomprehension she once felt herself. She smiles secretly to herself.
robyn.dixon@latimes.com
