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This is the story of a wine......
Not so much a tale of a producer and a snapshot of the vintage, although some historical context will be given. It is more the story of a drinker’s personal journey with a particular wine and one that I have been lucky enough to try on a few occasions over the years.....that wine is the 1962 Penfolds Bin 60A.
I first tried the wine in the mid-nineties. I was working in wine retail, spending far too much of my wages on wine to feed my seemingly insatiable appetite for vinous knowledge. The wine, while cheap by today’s prices was still out of reach for a lowly shelf stacker, so funds were pooled from several of my workmates and a dinner was planned around the wine we desperately longed to try.
Other wines were consumed at the dinner though I can’t for the life of me remember what they were. All I can remember is my reaction to the Bin 60A. The table fell quiet as the wine was poured and noses went to glass, eyes were closed as scents were taken in and processed. Still silent we all took a sip and swirled the liquid around our mouths.
I remember placing my glass on the table and saying a profanity, perhaps a little too loudly in a restaurant setting and then we all started talking at once.....we’d hit a great example of one of the world’s great wines. Seemingly infinitely complex in its aromas, still sweetly-fruited in the mouth with great resonance on the palate and a finish that trailed off in a vapour-trail of red-fruits and leather.
This blend of Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon and Barossa Shiraz off the gently sloping sandy rises of Kalimna was made by Max Schubert and is considered to be one of Australia’s, if not the world’s finest wines. Decanter Magazine in 2004, in their “Top 100 Wines OF All Time” ranked the 1962 Penfolds Bin 60A at number 7....in the Top 10 wines to try before you die along with 1945 Chateau Mouton Rothschild, 1921 Chateau Y’Quem, 1961 Chateau Latour and 1978 Domaine de la Romanee Conti La Tache. Esteemed company indeed.
I’d tried the wine several times in the years following, sometimes the wine was singing and other times it was a little down confirming the adage that there are no great old wines, just great old bottles and provenance is the key.
In 2004, I tried the wine at the Yalumba Museum Tasting at the Wharf in Sydney. The line-up of wines on the day was absolutely mind-blowing.....old DRC’s, Bordeaux First Growths galore, and some of the greatest Australian wines ever produced and the Bin 60A stood tall in the tasting, proving its pedigree.
After the tasting we were told to grab whatever bottles of wine we wanted to drink over lunch....a quick meeting was convened with wine-writer Nick Stock and we raced off to procure our booty. I made a beeline straight for the Bin 60A table and managed to get my hands on a bottle that was half-full when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned to see the great Len Evans standing next to my and he leaned in a said “a very good choice my boy”....I went back to our table beaming from ear to ear.
Again in 2006, at a Penfolds Single Bottle dinner at Glass Brassiere in Sydney, I had the chance to try this magical wine. Several bottles were open throughout the room, some better than others but again, although many great wines from a range of vintages were on show....whenever I talked to someone at the event the conversation would always include “that wine”.
In 2010 I received a phone call from then Brokenwood winemaker P.J. Charteris asking me to come and give him a hand polishing glasses destined for use the next day at the first Landmark Tutorial in the Barossa. The bonus was that the lucky buggers at the tutorial had just done the historical tasting that day, and P.J. dangled the carrot of a tasting session of the unfinished bottles after the work had been completed...of course I said yes.
We huddled around a couple of cases of half empty bottles in the kitchen of Appellation restaurant in the Barossa....it’s funny that when great bottles of wine are around, people start appearing out of nowhere....Matt the sommelier at Appellation poked his head in, Steve Pannell arrived amongst others and we tucked into what was an amazing historical perspective of Australian wine. The standout...you guessed it....the 1962 Bin 60A.
There is a reason that the 1962 Bin 60A is used as a benchmark wine in tastings around the world....it is world class. Most importantly though and a sign of its greatness is its ability to focus the taster on what is in the glass, its ability to bring back vivid memories of past meetings and who you tried the wine with and its ability to give you a glimpse a greatness.
As Len Evans said at the museum tasting “to head into the future you have to look at what we have done in the past” .....and looking at wines such as the Bin 60A is a great pleasure indeed.
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