It’s not just South Africa’s prop forwards that are big, burly bruisers. Most South African red wines come out of the scrum smelling of something distinctly other than violets. Unlike other hot, arid southern hemisphere countries which have mostly eradicated their archaic pongs, South Africa has yet to tame its peculiar, savage, burnt rubber and dirt odour. Other commentators either fail to take offence, or euphemistically dismiss the smell and taste as “smoky”, “earthy” or “tarry”. South Africans themselves are tolerant of their country’s distinctive red wine characteristic, and even British merchants specialising in Cape wines often just don’t see it.

Earlier this month at the vast Wines of South Africa generic tasting, I blind-tasted a run of the country’s flagship reds, priced from £16 to £40 a bottle and mostly Bordeaux-inspired blends, and half of them displayed this unpleasant taint. Fortunately, not everyone in the South African wine industry is blind to the problem. Master of Wine Lynne Sherriff, originally from Cape Town, acknowledged the odour and admitted that, “It’s now on the radar screen of the top Cape players.”

Hard to know precisely what produces the smell. It is nothing to do with the weird, jammy, nail varnish scent that is the hallmark of South Africa’s own indigenous pinotage grape – a cross between pinot noir and cinsault – though this variety frequently suffers from the pong. Nor should it be confused with the deliciously tasty, savoury quality that lots of South African reds reek of, reminiscent, as Sherriff puts it, of olive or tomato paste. Nor do I think it has anything to do with the occasionally rubbery, rotten egg-scented hydrogen sulphide infection that the previous generation of Aussie reds suffered from. So far all South African commentators can come up with is that they think this burnt rubber smell is associated either with unacceptably high yields, virused vines, a pH-related bacterial infection, or that it’s just what occurs during a typical Cape red wine ferment and maceration session.

If all that winemaking mumbo-jumbo is putting you off, move on swiftly to one of my current four favourite Cape reds. Waitrose stocks a duo, both perfect with a game casserole. Take your pick from Diemersfontein’s masterly 2006 Pinotage (£7.99), with its sweet, burnt, heavy, peppery fruit, or, for £2 more, Ken Forrester’s delicious, briary 2005 Lonely Grenache (£9.99), made from a low-yielding vineyard of 50-year-old grenache vines. Or with a rib of beef, try Neil Ellis’s spicy, sandalwood-scented 2004 Vineyard Selection Cabernet Sauvignon, another 14 per cent alcohol wonder (£19, Swig, 020-8995 7060). Finally, splash out on the beefy, cedar and spice box-scented 14.5 per cent alcohol 2003 Vergelegen Red, predominantly cabernet sauvignon, topped up with merlot and cabernet franc (£22.99, Tesco).

Burly? Yes. Pongy? Definitely not.

jane.macquitty@thetimes.co.uk

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