It is exactly 10 years since one show result made the world of wine sit up and take notice of Tasmania.
Nick Glaetzer of Glaetzer-Dixon Family Wines took out the most famous wine show trophy in Australia, the Jimmy Watson Trophy at the 2011 Royal Melbourne Wine Show, with a cool-climate Tasmanian shiraz.
The 2010 Mon Père Shiraz, named after Nick's winemaker father Colin, attracted global attention: a Tasmanian shiraz beating the best of Australia. It was a mighty feat and put Tasmanian reds other than pinot noir firmly in the spotlight.
Barossa boy turned fierce Tasmanian advocate Glaetzer hosted a one-off tasting event at his urban winery in Hobart this weekend to celebrate the 10th anniversary.
The 50th Jimmy Watson Memorial Trophy winner caused a stir in national and international media as he was the first Tasmanian to win Australia’s most prestigious wine prize.
The Mon Père Shiraz has since become something of a cult wine for Glaetzer-Dixon, selling out quickly each year.
Glaetzer has, however, kept a precious few cases aside from each vintage, including of the 2010 Mon Père, which also took out the trophy for Best Rhone Style or Shiraz at the 2011 Melbourne show.
It is now being offered for sale - with an extremely limited number of bottles on offer - to mark the memorable milestone.
The tasting on Saturday featured a vertical tasting of the Mon Père from the wine’s inception in 2008 to the current release from 2018. And proud Dad Colin was in attendance.
As well as the 2010, the line-up of museum wines include the 2011 Mon Père, which won a major trophy at the Tasmanian Wine Show in 2012.
Glaetzer has not entered a wine show since (“Why tempt fate!” he figures, plus his production volumes are very low.).
All the wines - with the possible exception of the 2009 - looked lively and vital - a guide to their cellaring potential. The new release 2018 also looks potentially long lived.
In the decade since, plantings of shiraz (also known as syrah) in Tasmania have tripled.
Shiraz/syrah production exceeded cabernet production in Tasmania for the first time in 2021.
Next year, in the 2022 vintage, Nick and his wife Sally Glaetzer (née Dixon), who both hail from the Barossa, will harvest the first shiraz from their new vineyard at Tea Tree in the Coal River Valley, which they planted in 2018.
"Among the new vines are some Barossa Old Vine cuttings, taken from a 100-year-old vineyard in the Barossa, which we sourced as a nod to our Barossa heritage but also because we are excited to see what Tassie’s unique climate and the soil profile will do to this particular shiraz clone,” he says.
Details of the tasting at gdfwinemakers.com/shiraz/vertical-tasting
Image: Glaetzer-Dixon Wines/Dearna Bond
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