Third top award for student winemaker | Hawkes Bay News | Local News in Hawkes Bay

An inherited condition that seriously affects Jonathan Musther's sight hasn't stopped the talented EIT student from winning top accolades in Hawke's Bay's regional wine competition.

Jon's dessert wine, The Mongoose, claimed gold and the EIT Best Student Wine Trophy in the Hawke's Bay A&P; Mercedes-Benz Wine Awards. Judges scored the 2009 botrytised Chardonnay 55.5 out of a possible 60 points.

In the final year of his Bachelor of Viticulture and Bachelor of Wine Science concurrent degree, Jon is a solid A student.

Head of School, Diane Marshall, said this was the third successive year that he had won the EIT-sponsored Best Student Wine Trophy. Entries in previous competitions were wines he made with other students.

This year he entered two other wines made with former classmate Stuart Kennedy. Both reds, they were each awarded a bronze medal.

Although the student wine category is open to all educators, all 10 wines entered this year were from EIT. Seven attracted awards.

Of the 19 trophies awarded, many were accepted by EIT graduates.

EIT entries were relatively low this year, she said, because this year's difficult vintage conditions had meant students having to work with a lot of poor quality fruit.

"Some of the wine entered was made in previous years which helped increase the medal tally," Ms Marshall said.

The only student wine to have won gold previously at the Hawke's Bay show was made by Tracy Taylor, who has since graduated from EIT and was an associate judge in the competition.

Chairman of Judges Rod McDonald said assessing student wines was always a challenge because of the diversity of quality, styles and varieties.

"The students are set the task of making the best wine they can from small batches of fruit. The small lots make it difficult for them to achieve the same consistency and quality that you see in commercial wineries," he said. Overall, the standard of student entries was high.

"All the judges were most impressed by Jonathan's wine, and not only with its purity but also because of the technical requirements involved in making dessert wines. They're among the most challenging from a technical point of view."

Fruitful research

Formerly from England, Jon made headlines earlier this year with research findings that challenge the efficacy of plunging the cap - a traditional practice in making red wine.

Jon was awarded a Mission Estate Wine and Viticulture Scholarship which provided him with the fruit, equipment and facilities to undertake a research project - a requirement for all third-year Bachelor of Viticulture students at EIT.

During the last summer holidays, he was back at the Mission lab, working under the direction of winemaker Paul Mooney, to more fully investigate the effects of managing the cap - the skins, pips and stalks that winemakers traditionally submerge into fermenting red wine to impart colour, flavour and tannins.

A chief finding of Jon's research - which he agrees is counter-intuitive - was that the most densely coloured wines were those subjected to the least plunging, while the least dense was the wine with the most plunging.