Hewitson Private Cellar reserve Shiraz 2008
Tasting Team decided not to write about this wine because nobody was just taking the notes! And each and all of us were indulged in the tasting the wine! All Hewitson wines have been so enviable that we became little, inquisitive fans, asking lots and lots of questions. Absolute decadence. Dean Hewitson is using the best terroir and varietals(His Gun Metal Rieslings with fruit Eden; his Lulu Sb with fruit from Mount Baker and Adelaide Hills; his centurion Mourvedre and Shiraz for all sort of ‘Bush’ wines and Old World styled Shiraz and GSMC)s to make other excellent wines. In that tasting, it is the first time we feel words are useless.
So let’s review the historics and achievements and release the best tasting notes written.
Hewitson was founded in 1998 as a result of winemaker Dean Hewitson’s driving passion to produce world-class wine from the historic, dry-grown vineyards of South Australia’s very best regions including the Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale and the Adelaide Hills.
Beginning his career straight out of school Dean completed his winemaking degree at Australia’s world-famous Roseworthy Agricultural College in 1986 may not mean anything. What’s even more important for Dean is that he has seen the world. His studies was then followed by working for a decade in one of Australia’s leading wineries. During this time Dean worked three vintages in France, visiting its many diverse regions including Bordeaux, Burgundy, Champagne, Beaujolais, The Rhone and Provence. Here he gained considerable knowledge in Old-World winemaking techniques and learnt the value of great vineyards. Dean then travelled to California to study at the renowned UC Davis, California, completing his Masters in Winemaking in two years. He toured the West Coast of the United States, visiting and working in regions such as Santa Barbara, Napa Valley, Oregon and Washington State.
This background is reflected in the wines Hewitson makes, particular this Hewitson Private Cellar reserve Shiraz 2008, which combine Old-World traditions with New-World fruit purity.
The sources of these wines are from some of the oldest vines on the planet, stretching back to 1853, and many of them pre-Phylloxera. Look at this:
Dean Hewitson believes great wines are the expression of the soils they are grown in and the season they are grown. It naturally follows that many of Dean’s wines are single vineyard. They possess those qualities that make great wine: balance, structure, concentration, power and breeding.
Proudly, through solar energy, water recycling and encouraging natural biodiversity, Hewitson brings these wines to your table environmentally sustainable.
We located important citations are as follows:
Hewitson has been rated Equal Top Wine in Australia with Grange and Hill of Grace James Halliday Wine Companion 2008. Hewitson has also been voted Best Blend in Australia The Good Wine Guide 2011. it is also rated Best in Australia for Shiraz and Family by James Halliday Wine Companion 2013. Last but not laeast, it is the HHHHH FIVE STAR WINERY RATING by James Halliday.
Another an important comment from RP. “Hewitson is one of my favourite Barossa wineries for French-inspired, classic, intensely flavorful as well as elegant wines aged primarily in French Oak.” – Robert Parker, The Wine Advocate, Issue 161, Oct 2005.
Nick Stock, in The Good Wine Guide ~ 'Best Blend in Australia' ~ 96 Points
"The Worlds Oldest Mourvèdre Vines" The Wine Detective
Nick Stock, The Good Wine Guide ~ 96 Points ~ 'Best Blend in Australia' ~ "This 2008 Private Cellar release is a shiraz-mourvèdre blend with immense poise and grace, fusing two varieties together with seamless stitching. With smells of blue plum and blackberry, really ripe and nicely spiced-up in the winery, the oak's well matched. The palate's supple and even, with a strong, ripe sweet-fruit presence that'sunderscored by evenly placed savoury tannin structure. The palate traces a long line through the finish; really impressive line and length here. Nicely bowled, Mr Hewitson!"
James Halliday, Australian Wine Companion ~ 96 Points ~ ".....texture and structure all harmoniously interwoven; perfect line, length and balance; the 20-year cellaring suggestion on the label is conservative......Good colour to a wine highlighting the synergy between old vine shiraz and mourvedre; the bouquet has an array of sultry black fruits which the palate builds on with its complex flavour..."
One of our favoruite commentator Sarah Ahmed wrote, in The Wine Detective ~ 'Hewitson Breeding the Worlds.
Oldest Mourvèdre' ~ "Hewitson has steadily amassed an enviable portfolio of old (nineteenth century) vine material under his eponymous label......the beautiful texture of his wines, which I’d summarise as iron first in velvet glove. The fruit and lees are the velvet. Minerality and tannin are the fist which deliver a long, linear, extended finish."
2009 ~International Wine Challenge ~ Silver
2010~~International Wine Challenge ~ Commended
