From the ashes, a reassuring ‘bright light’ for the Henschkes

Prue and Stephen Henschke’s Adelaide Hills winery has been awarded the highly coveted Winery of the Year title.

Prue and Stephen Henschke’s Eden Valley winery in the ­Barossa has taken out James Halliday’s Winery of the Year award. Picture: Roy Van Der Vegt

When Prue and Stephen Henschke stood before their ­Adelaide Hills winery the morning after the Christmas bushfires, what greeted them was as close to the gates of hell as they could imagine. Right down to smouldering dirt, ashes and the smell of brimstone.

“We had a chemical shed that got totally gutted and nearby you could smell the burning sulphur, that really choking acrid sulphur dioxide, it was hard to breathe,’’ Prue Henschke said.

“The vineyard was black, absolutely black and smouldering, and quite hot so you had to be careful where you trod — it was sooty, dusty.’’

“Everything was gone,’’ added Stephen Henschke. “The trees were just bare, like blackened skeletons, and our vineyards were still smoking, hot and smoking, and the smell was just awful.”

Now life is reborn. At Lenswood in the Adelaide Hills, there are new green shoots on the once-blackened vine stumps and there is further reason to cheer after the Henschke family’s flagship Barossa winery at Eden Valley was on Wednesday night awarded the highly coveted Winery of the Year title in the 2021 Halliday Wine Companion Awards.

Also taking home accolades on Wednesday were Wine of the Year to the Brokenwood Graveyard Vineyard Hunter Valley Shiraz 2018, Winemaker of the Year to Brett Grocke of Eperosa Wines, Barossa Valley, and Best New Winery of the Year to Varney Wines in McLaren Vale.

The Henschkes’ Eden Valley vineyard in the cooler part of the Barossa’s Mount Lofty Ranges, now ranks as Australia’s pre-eminent winery, says wine writer and critic James Halliday, who chose it because of a deeper understanding he now has of the five generations of love, labour and splendid wines the family produces.

“It’s almost metaphysical, the things that they live for which is really very tightly bound to the Eden Valley, and when you look at their large number of individual wines, they are able to do that with just a toe in the water with the Barossa Valley and then their Adelaide Hills vineyard,’’ Halliday said.

“When I spoke to Stephen and asked what defines Henschke, his answer was this part of the Eden Valley is their spiritual home and woven through that idea of spirit­ual home is the culture, religion, music and wine.

“When you look at a wine by wine basis, it is extraordinary, just that never failing quality.’’

It was only three years ago that fifth-generation winemaker Stephen and his viticulturist wife were celebrating being awarded wine of the year by Halliday for his Eden Valley superstar Henschke Hill of Grace 2012.

 

The Henschke vineyards have long been a creative, rich cradle for some of the nation’s premier wines. Henschke has produced wines of consistently flawless quality, according to Halliday, including the stellar 2015 Hill of Grace Shiraz, this year awarded 99 points by the wine doyen.

In this year’s Halliday Wine Companion, Henschke has six wines scoring 97-99 points, four scoring 96 points, nine scoring 95, and 10 scoring between 90 and 94 points.

He describes the Henschke wines featured in his Wine Companion as an “avalanche” of wonderful wines.

“I think winning the award is very reassuring after what we have been through,’’ Stephen Henschke said.

“We didn’t expect this after the tragedy of an incredible tough year with drought, bushfires and then COVID-19; this is a lovely bright light and we are really overjoyed as it has come as incredibly opportune for us and we are proud to receive it.’’