If there's one question Ken Helm's been asking himself for the past 70-odd years it's "why?"
From his earliest days as a CSIRO scientist, through his 12 years on the Yass council, to his award-winning vineyard, it's been his innate curiosity that's driven him every day.
Helm attributes a lot of his success to his early days at the CSIRO.
"I worked there for 20 years - it was the halcyon days when the CSIRO was there to break down the barriers of knowledge," he says.
The pioneers of the Canberra District Wine industry worked alongside him, Clonakilla's John Kirk and Edgar Reik, who planted the first local vines on the shores of Lake George in 1971.
"We would sit around at morning tea, we would question everything about our research, ask 'why?' about everything we were doing," he says.
"Even now I question everything. I want answers to all sorts of things."
One of the most recent questions he asked himself was "Why can't I make a rose from riesling grapes?"
Strangely, for a man with his experience, he didn't believe many people drank rose. He was in a bottle shop talking to his sellers and was surprised by the extensive range of the blush pink wine.
"So then I started looking at what people were drinking in restaurants. I do that quite a lot. I'm not staring, and every second table was drinking rose," he says.
"So I asked myself why can't you make a rose out of riesling, they make it out of red grapes, why can't I reverse the process and instead of taking the juice off the skins of a red grape early to get the blush, why don't you make a riesling, and then during the fermentation, add some cabernet to give it the blush."
He made a small batch last vintage and only put it on the cellar door. It sold out in a month.
It's back in larger quantities for the 2023 vintage, which will be released on May 27.
After three years of impossible conditions, Helm reckons this vintage is one of his best in the 47 he's had since he first planted his vines in 1973.
"We've had three really dreadful years. First the drought, then the smoke and then the next year the vines were still struggling from all of that," Helm says.
"Then in 2022, we lost 60 per cent of the crop with the hailstorm and mini-tornado that hit in January."
This vintage, with its wettest spring, cooler summer "and beautiful dry autumn" was a typical European vintage, he says. Riesling and cabernet both thrive in such conditions; shiraz not so much.
"You could almost call it the year of the century. Everything just came together," he says.
"I rate these wines amongst the top three vintages that I've ever made in the last 47 seasons."
Is it hard for him to pick a favourite vintage? His cellar is full of wines from over the years; they're covered in dust and full of memories. He talks about the years his children were born and how those wines tasted. Wines that meant a lot to both him and his wife of more than 50 years, the patient Judith.
"Every year is different, I'm just the custodian of the grapes," he says.
"It's the vineyard that does all the work. I've always believed as a winemaker all I have to do is pick the grapes at the right time and the wines will make themselves and this year that's what happened.
"We were harvesting in mid-March to late-March, which was one of the latest harvests ever and we've already bottled them and put them on the market.
"The wines just fell into place, they fermented perfectly, the flavours stayed there, they cleared perfectly, they settled perfectly and I said, 'Time to bottle. Let's capture all that in the bottle, capture the genie in the bottle before we lose he'r."
The vintage release includes five wines: the riesling rose, the half-dry riesling, the Tumbarumba, the classic dry riesling and the premium riesling, the 16th vintage of this style from the vineyard's premium Lustenberger vines.
Could it be his last? Does he ever think about retirement?
"I retired in 1988 when I left the CSIRO," he says.
"Sure it's been hard work, but I don't think of it as work. I've got a few people here doing all the heavy lifting for me now. I just wander around like a prima donna. Every day I get up and look across the vineyard and think, 'I'm a very lucky man'."
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