Henschke 2018: Single-vineyard releases

Henschke is releasing the new vintage of its five single-site Eden Valley wines together for the first time on 3 May, in celebration of a series of anniversaries.

Scroll down for tasting notes and scores of the Henschke 2018 releases

The 2018 Hill of Grace marks 60 years since fourth-generation winemaker Cyril Henschke first created what was to become Australia’s most famous single-vineyard Shiraz.

And the wine named in his honour, the Cyril Henschke Cabernet Sauvignon, celebrates the 40th anniversary of its first vintage.

The 66th release of Mount Edelstone Shiraz, arguably Australia’s longest consecutively produced single-vineyard wine, the 15th release of Hill of Roses, a mass selection from 1860-planted Hill of Grace vines, and the fourth release of The Wheelwright, whose vines were 50 years old in 2018, make up the Eden Valley single-site reds.

Henschke released Keyneton Euphonium 2018, a Shiraz-Cabernet blend from Eden Valley and Barossa Valley fruit last year.

Fifth-generation winemaker Stephen Henschke and his viticulturalist wife Prue described the 2018 vintage as ‘a standout of the decade’ – a fitting year to mark the 150th anniversary of Henschke family winemaking.

‘The wines from 2018 have wonderful complexity, richness, depth and balance, an expressive sense of place, and fine and mature tannins,’ explained Stephen. ‘They are comparable to exceptional-quality vintages such as 1982, 1990, 2002 and 2010, all from mild seasons that have shown excellent ageing potential in ideal cellaring conditions.’

2018: an exceptional vintage

It’s the fourth vintage in a row the Henschkes have rated ‘exceptional’. During a video call with them, Prue said that while the ripening period leading up to the harvest between 21 March and 14 April was ideal, conditions leading up to that were ‘bizarre’, ‘bamboozling’ and ‘a real climate change scenario’: rain, frost and hail, then very hot weather in mid-January followed by more rain in February which led to cool conditions for veraison.

‘I think that’s why the wines look really well balanced because the vines didn’t have to go through extremes of weather during ripening,’ she said.

In terms of grape maturity on the vine, Stephen felt that 2018 was a ‘picture-book season’ giving ‘beautiful, perfumed, fragrant, complex red wines that are elegant, as Eden Valley always is, but with bright fruit flavours and a lovely plushness alongside that elegance’.

Another distinguishing feature of the 2018s, he added, was the ‘fine, textural tannins’ which run through all the reds.

‘But the thing that Prue and I have attempted to achieve is a sense of place in each of our wines. So the wine speaks of the vineyard, not an oak forest, and you get that beautiful flavour of the unique vineyard site – that you can taste how Wheelwright is different to Mount Edelstone and Hill of Grace and Hill of Roses.’

Tasting the Henschke 2018 wines

That elegance, plushness and texture shines through, not least in the Cyril Henschke Cabernet Sauvignon. Not made in 2017 – ‘we didn’t get the maturity’, said Stephen – the 2018 is a fitting toast to his father, who first planted their Cabernet Sauvignon vineyard in 1969.

‘We have this single vineyard planted to Cabernet, Merlot and Franc on a gentle north-facing slope that acts as a solar panel, so we get lovely maturity in the Cabernet in those warmer years,’ he explained, particularly when combined with the late-ripening season in 2018.

‘We’ll look back in years to come and say: wasn’t 2018 a great vintage? It really is.’

The lightest and most Pinot-esque of the Henschke’s single-site Eden Valley Shirazes is The Wheelwright, named in honour of Stephen’s great-great-grandfather Johann Christian Henschke, founder of the family winery in 1868. Stephen’s father Cyril planted the vineyard in 1968 to celebrate the centenary, so this latest vintage (the fourth release) coincides with the vines turning 50 and the winery’s 150th anniversary.

‘The 2018 has sparked up beautifully,’ quipped Stephen, describing it as the perfect example of the fragrant, red-fruited, spicy, floral elegance of the southern Eden Valley.

Mount Edelstone in 2018 is superb. Typically modest, he said he was ‘really fond of it’, later admitting it is ‘one of our greatest examples of Mount Edelstone’.

First bottled by Stephen’s father Cyril in 1952 from a vineyard now 111 years old, 66 vintages have been released, making it arguably Australia’s oldest consistently produced single-vineyard wine.

‘The flavours really build on the palate,’ Stephen said of the 2018, ‘rolling across it and going forever. It’s a definitive Shiraz for Australia, but particularly Eden Valley because of the distinctive black pepper, sage and blackberry flavours.’

Hill of Grace and Hill of Roses

Always exciting is the chance to taste Australia’s most iconic single-vineyard Shiraz, Hill of Grace, alongside Hill of Roses, made from a mass selection of the original 1860-planted Grandfathers vines.

Prue planted this nursery block in 1989 for eventual inclusion into Hill of Grace. While the concentration is not there yet, its character became unique enough at 12 years old for it to be first bottled as a single-vineyard wine in 2001.

‘We’ve done some verticals to see how flavours of Hill of Grace and Hill of Roses are approaching each other. As the vines are getting older we’re starting to see more similarities,’ said Stephen.

‘But at 29 years old in 2018, it is still young for us,’ he adds. ‘So it’s not there yet but getting closer all the time. Not everybody has 30-year-old vines to compare to 150-year-old vines, so it has been a really interesting exercise to see how they change and when young vines really do become old vines.’

While Hill of Roses has a red raspberry, beetroot and candied prettiness to it, Hill of Grace exudes an exotic, earthy, spicy allure. It’s hugely complex, with concentrated deep, dark fruits and what Stephen highlights as ‘root vegetables’.

While these reds from Barossa old vines (35 years or more), Survivor vines (70+), Centenarian vines (100+) and Ancestor vines (125+) will age superbly for decades yet, Stephen recommends that people not only decant them, but taste them over several days.

‘After two, three, four days you get a completely new story every time you taste. It’s amazing how old-vine Barossa Shiraz can do that.’

Henschke 2018 single-vineyard wines plus other new releases

The 2018 vintages of Hill of Grace, Hill of Roses, Mount Edelstone, The Wheelwright and Cyril Henschke are available from the Henschke cellar door and website (henschke.com.au), in the UK via importer Liberty Wines and in the US via Winebow from Wednesday 3 May 2023.

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