Henschke 1998 Hill Of Grace or ….

By way of background, early in 2004 I wrote an article called Is Henschke Living on its Reputation which generated more feedback than an other article I have written, almost all of it in a hundred percent agreement. Recently I went to a trade tasting where there was a Henschke stand and tried some of their new releases, which were very credible wines (you can see the reviews here.) During that tasting, I was "grilled" about the original article by someone with a Henschke name tag called Arch Baker. 

Now Henschke have as much right to comment about what I wrote as I had to write it, so there is no issue there. To briefly recap one important aspect of our conversation that was outlined in last weeks Irregular Update, Arch Baker said, "We have no Brett in the winery. There was a problem with Brett in the 1998 Mt Edelstone. We moved that wine into a new storage facility that had not been air conditioned. Straight after that, we were hit with a record number of days where the temperature was over forty degrees and we did not check the finished wine before it went out after it had been in the new storage. That was our mistake because the heat affected the wine."

So here are two points. Firstly, according to Arch, there is no Brett in the winery and secondly, the Brett in the 98 Mount Edelstone was caused by heat. Brett can be exacerbated by heat but it has to be there in the first place. So saying it was caused by the heat is not exactly correct.

As a result of my comments last week, I received an email from Campbell Mattinson of WineFront Monthly, a respected independent wine journalist who had this to say.

"I was at a tasting last week where all the wines were served blind. One of the wines turned out to be Henschke Hill of Grace 1998. The wine was bretty as all hell, put down your glasses, no question about it. No brett in the Henschke winery? It's very disappointing to hear that - because until they recognise and admit it, they will never take the right steps to get rid of it - or so you'd reckon. Note, this was the Hill of Grace, not the Mount Edelstone. Whether or not Henschke have a brett problem now I do not know, but they certainly had a significant problem with it in 1998, and it showed all the way to the top of the range. Happy to be quoted on this."

Prior to writing this article, I advised Henschke of Campbell's comments and of my intention of write an article. In my correspondence to them I said " I would to love to have the opportunity to talk to you so I can get your position and present a complete story. I am not out to lynch Henschke and commit to present your comments fairly." They declined to respond to my communication.

The Brett situation is very disturbing indeed. As Campbell states, they may not have a Brett problem now but it was there is 1998. Minor amounts of Brett, in some cases, is seen as adding complexity but in larger amounts is seen as a fault. It can also vary from bottle to bottle and usually becomes significantly worse if storage conditions are less than ideal. When the wine is young, it also often does not show as much as when the wine has aged so it is an insidious, fickle and unpredictable little microbe, but there is no real excuse for a winery not knowing they have Brett in their wine, or in the winery. The winemakers should be talented enough to pick it up prior to release and if it is picked up early enough, it can be eliminated prior to bottling.

When I sent a draft copy of my proposed article to Campbell, he responded with the following. "I've now been in two separate, BLIND tastings where the wine has been picked as bretty by assembled wine press so *in some bottles at least*, I don't think this fact can be disputed. What can be disputed is the extent this level of brett affects the wine. Clearly, some wine drinkers will drink 98 HOG and legitimately love it (i.e. they won't just be drinking the label). My argument then is not whether or not the wine is any good; it's simply that no one should deny that it has brett. All I'd like Henschke to do, if asked, is to say: yes, it has a level of brettanomyces, but we believe it's still a great wine worthy of the label. Once they've said that, then we can all go back to making up our own minds as to whether we like the style or not."

Let’s face it; Hill Of Grace has a platinum-clad reputation amongst Australian wine-lovers and by our standards, at $300+ a bottle, a price to match. French wine lovers may be prepared to shell out $300 for a stinky wine that is not particularly enjoyable but we have higher expectations for our wines in Australia. There are a other wines that are as good as Hill Of Grace, that will age as well, or as rare or unique that cost significantly less, the Tahbilk 1860's vines Shiraz, which are all of these things, at around a third of the price of Hill Of Grace, immediately comes to mind.

Recently,  Henschke held events in Sydney's and Melbourne to launch the latest wines including the 1999 Hill Of Grace. Naturally the top wine journalists were invited to the event and they were privileged to be allowed to taste the wine. At the Tuckers Trade tasting I attended, there was no Hill Of Grace available. The reason I point this out is not one of jealousy, it is to show how difficult it is to taste the Hill of Grace prior to purchase, not even the general trade get to try it (there may be a few exceptions.) The Tahbilk 1860's Vines was available for tasting that day (also at cellar door) and when Grange is released consumers find little difficulty in finding an event, even if it costs, where they get the opportunity to try the wine.

As a result, most people buying Hill Of Grace are purchasing it based on its reputation and other known factors like vintage conditions. Imagine what will happen in a few years when people start to open the 1998 bottles that have been lovingly stored and kept for a very special occasion if the bottle is badly affected by Brett (remember, if the bottles are stored less than perfectly, any Brett can be exacerbated.) Will the 1998 Hill Of Grace become know as the Hill Of Disgrace?

When you have a platinum reputation you cannot afford to tarnish it. Trying to cover it up by staff members saying it does not exist, and when it does it was caused by heat, does not add to the credibility.

It is time to come clean, admit it, fix it and have an action plan to placate unhappy purchasers of both the 98 Mt Edelstone and 98 Hill of Grace.