Germany's 2013 Rieslings - Top quality, tiny quantity...

It is very hard to travel out to a region with the intention of tasting the latest vintage without having heard or read somebody’s views on it. These days there seem to be no end of people desperate to evaluate a vintage as early as possible. Everyone wants the first scoop, regardless of whether the wines are in a state that allows fair evaluation. During this most recent trip I even heard of notes being published from cloudy, still fermenting tank samples. Now I may be wrong, but it seems to me that unless you are a highly practiced winemaker, this is surely simple conjecture? Be that as it may, many had put forth their views and as a result my mood as I prepared for my trip was somewhat pessimistic. To put it bluntly I feared painful teeth and tart, rather aggressively acidic wines. 

But let it be known here, straight away: my fear was unfounded – there are some very good wines in this vintage. Indeed there are some that rank in the realms of truly excellent.  Make no mistake, no-one is suggesting that this was an easy vintage. In fact, as late as the start of October many growers feared a truly disastrous vintage.

The village of Oberhausen, in the Nahe.

Refreshingly, none of the growers I saw tried to pretend that October was a delight. There was no golden autumn here. There was plenty of warmth, but it was accompanied by plenty of rain. The conditions were perfect for the spread rot, which would have been fine if ripeness had already been a fait accompli. But as it was, the final days probably caused more than a few local grey hairs as ripeness, acidity, and botrytis (the last bringing with it a rapidly decreasing yield) converged upon a sweet spot with lightning speed.  Blink, and you would have missed it.  

The problems started at flowering. After a cool, damp start to the year, a protracted flowering started later and lasted longer than usual. In many places it was still going on right up to the end of June. Such a delayed, stop start beginning to the season laid the (rather unstable) foundations for the vintage, producing uneven clusters of grapes that were going to require ripening well into late October. July and August provided a crucial fillip being hot and relatively dry, but come September cooler weather had returned, notably during the nights. By late September acidity levels were high, ripeness seemed a long way off, and neither situation looked like changing any time soon.

The view from the top of Wehlener Sonnenuhr, looking downstream to
Graach and then Bernkastel, in the distance

So far so bad, eh? Well, it certainly seemed that way, and yet somehow I saw an enormous amount of wines to get excited about. I should caveat this by acknowledging that the growers I saw represent the crème de la crème of Germany’s winemaking talent, but truly growers from all regions reported their own surprise at what a successful and balanced set of wines they had turned out. Certainly this is a vintage of high acidity, but not so high as to make the wines either difficult to taste or difficult to enjoy. And while acidity levels are definitely higher than in 2012 and 2011, they are actually slightly lower than in 2010. Furthermore, the type and character of the acidity seems completely different to 2010 being riper, less nervous and less concentrated. The wines have edge and a certain driving focus, but it seldom comes across as aggressive, in spite of marginally lower than usual Oeschle levels.

How is this balance so? Put simply, the presence of high levels of extract with very complex minerality seem to have bonded with these high levels of tartaric acidity to form a tripod of structural elements that against all the odds have created wines of high focus and balance. These are not Rieslings which drip with sun-drenched fruit. They are built on more earth-bound lines than that. But that is not to say they have no fruit - many have wonderful fruit of sometimes startling clarity, but it is invariably set amidst scenes of high minerality and palpable extract. Savoury,  salty notes compete with clear golden fruit and botrytis, when it is present, is almost exclusively of the very fresh, clear and pure type.

I have no doubt that it would have been a very easy vintage in which to make bad wine. Talking to people across the regions it seems there are no shortage of wines which have required excessive de-acidification resulting in flat wines that lack energy. Growers had to make the correct decisions not just at harvest, but right the way through the season. If you didn’t put the work in from day one,  this was a vintage which would really show it. If your vines weren’t in exceptional condition come October you were in for some serious problems. Furthermore, come harvest, at breakneck speed you had to make the right call as to what and how many wines you were going to attempt to make. At JJ Prum, Katharina decided that to make a range of Spatlese she would have had to pick wines with acidities and unripe fruit profiles that simply would not have made for harmonious wines. As a result it was a brief tasting at this great estate; we started with an estate Kabinet, moved straight up to four Auslese and finished with a pair of Auslese Goldcap. What they’ve made is glorious, how much they’ve made is not.

For virtually all the growers I saw the greatest problem this year is quantity. Yields for growers in the Saar, Mosel and Ruwer are down by approximately 50%. In the Nahe, perhaps the region least affected by the weather gods, they are down about 20%. In the Rheingau, depending on where your vineyards were, you had between 20% and 40% less wine. The biggest reason for these figures was the accelerated onset of botrytis. Come harvest, day by day, growers saw their yields decreasing as grapes shrivelled in front of their eyes.

The Helden vineyard in Niederberg, with Brauneberger Juffer Sonnenuhr
in the distance

So how will it go down in history? One thing that is clear that this is a vintage for Riesling lovers. From recent vintages there are elements from 2004 and 2008, some 2010 and maybe a touch of 2012 too. It will appeal to people who enjoy wines with mineral, cool fruit characters, but also those that love Germany’s diversity, for amongst all these factors, including the presence of much botrytis, the specific characteristics of site are particularly well articulated. It should appeal to lovers of the Grosses Gewachs, built as they are in the mould of the 2004s, or 2008s, with alcohol levels perhaps a degree lower than 2011 and half a degree lower than 2012, and highly complex mineral flavour profiles. And it will appeal to those who are interested in buying focussed, filigree and classically styled ‘pradikat’ wines with strong mineral personalities, very clear fruit, high ripe acid levels and the core density to last an extremely long time in the cellar.

The run of top quality Germany vintages continues. Lovers of these great wines have arguably never had it so good.

Julian Campbell

Buyer, Justerini & Brooks.

Germany 2012 – “grace and flavour”

Germany's great wine making regions make for a glorious buying trip when the sun is shining. When we arrived in the middle of June the sun unfortunately wasn't. Indeed, parts of the Rheingau had recently seen serious flooding. But nevertheless, the growers we visited, the elite by anybody's books, were cheeringly upbeat. As Carl von Schubert put, 'Riesling is the most innovative weed there is, capable of coping with even the most inauspicious of seasons'. The universal sentiment was that 'The vines maybe two weeks behind but they'll catch up. Nothing to worry about'. Plus ça change from the slightly more pessimistic 2013 outlook in other parts of Europe. By the time we left, temperatures well into the 30s seemed to confirm their optimism.

Dr. Carl von Schubert 

But of course, we were there to look at the 2012s; an unusual growing season that has produced a range of startling wines with characters and qualities that are almost incomparable in recent vintages.

The most universal and important theme for understanding the style of the wines in 2012 is the lack of botrytis. Across Germany rain at flowering led to coulure, or poor fruit set, which in turn produced loose bunches of small-berried, thick skinned fruit. As Klaus Peter Keller remarked, 'you can’t put in an order for berries like this, even if you’d always like to have them'. These loose bunches would become crucial to the success of the vintage, allowing botrytis preventing air to flow freely over the grapes as harvest approached. Widespread frost in October forced many to harvest then and there, with others such as Keller preferring to leave the grapes on the vines for a further week. Those that weren’t so badly affected by hail or frost, and who held their nerve, found themselves harvesting into November under sunshine and blue skies; ‘A golden autumn’ as Oliver Haag put it. This extremely long hang time allowed all the elements of the great Riesling grape to achieve full maturity in harmony, which, coupled with almost complete lack of botrytis, has given rise to grapes of startling purity, good must weights, fresh but most importantly ripe acidities and truly beautiful fruit characteristics. The only negatives are the small quantities and almost complete lack of noble sweet wines.

Keller Riesling Grapes 

In the Rheingau, where, as of 2012 the top dry wines will carry the Groses Gewachs designation rather than the Erstes Gewachs of old, we visited Spretizer in Oestrich, Weil in Kiedrich and further west, just around the corner from the great Rudesheimer Berg, August Kesseler. At Spreitzer the harvest came later than Andreas can remember in his 20 years of making wine at the estate, yet still they report acidities as high as ever before. Crucially, the long hang time meant their high levels of acidity are tartaric rather than malic, giving a ripe and juicy character to the wines rather than anything aggressive. Add to that the extended maturation of the flavours in each grape and the combination is one of flavoursome power, freshness and extract; a recipe for success in anyone’s book. The inimitable August Kesseler, in Assmanshauser described the vintage as a little 2001, a little 2004, and a little something else altogether. High ripe acidities and crystal clear flavours abound in August’s dry 2012s, while his reds from the richer 2011 vintage as good as we’ve seen from this estate – they will demand attention and further cement his reputation as one of Germany’s great Spatburgunder producers.

Across in the Mosel the word on everyone’s lips is ‘classical’. Yield are low, acidities are technically fresh yet come across as ripe, fruit flavours are clear and bright. It is telling that more than one producer we saw referred us back to vintages of old. The wines from Prüm, the Haag brothers, Willi Schaeffer and Zilliken (Saar) show high levels of finesse and elegance with strong slate characteristics and gloriously fresh Riesling fruit. The gamble for some was waiting to make the most of the Indian summer, which meant vineyard health had to be spot on. Those who had put the work in were rewarded with tremendous harvest conditions, giving rise to some of the most fleet of foot and alluring Rieslings we can remember at Spatlese level, the wines are masterclasses in effortless delivery of flavour and terroir definition, while at Auslese level the wines are intense yet immensely refreshing; the 2012 vintage truly shows off the Mosel at its dancing best.

JJ Prum Estate

In the Nahe both Helmut Dönnhoff and Frank Schönleber reported incredibly healthy grapes at harvest, indeed neither reported any botrytis whatsoever until as late as October. The rain that did fall in October was accompanied by cool temperatures allowing for a ripening of flavours and aromas without a great increase in sugars. As a result none of the Emrich-Schönleber  elegant Grosses Gewachs bottlings exceed 12.5% abv this year – a factor which merely enhances their pure drinkability without imparting any loss of flavour.  Dönnhoff's range, tasted at the end of a long day, should have been exhausting such is its size, but instead it simply blew us away. From the basic trockens up through some gloriously pure Grosses Gewachs and into the fruchtig range, Helmut, with the aid of his son Cornelius, continues to craft singularly pure Rieslings stamped with incredibly precise terroir characteristics. Together, these two growers continue to prove that the Nahe can produce wines on a par with any in all of Germany.

Our final stop was with Klaus-Peter Keller in Rheinhessen, a producer with a cult following who is doing more for the region than perhaps anyone else. Klaus-Peter was evidently and justly proud of his 2012s, describing the vintage as 'an affair of the heart; one of our favourite vintages' – and frankly we’re not about to argue. Keller’s wines are always marked by a sublime minerality. In 2012, the long hang time, 'like slow cooking', cool summer and large diurnal temperature swings at harvest time have produced multi-layered, profoundly clear wines, dry and sweet, of the highest pedigree. They will last a long time, yet like the very greatest of wines, are almost impossible to resist now.

**All the above wines will be offered in September following our annual German En Primeur tasting.

Portfolio Tasting 2013: Three masters of their trade

It was a huge pleasure to taste my way through the three masterclasses at our Portfolio tasting in the stunning surroundings of Somerset House last week. We were honoured to have three great wines estates presenting their finest wines, young and old.

First up was Katharina Prüm of JJ Prüm presenting no fewer than 9 wines in an hour from 2011 back to 1997. A hard act was brilliantly followed by Davide Voerzio of Roberto Voerzio, who talked us through 4 different Barolo Cru across various vintages and the evening fittingly culminated with the gentleman of Cote Rotie, Rene Rostaing, with whom we tasted La Landonne and Cote Blonde across 07, 05, 2000 and 1995.

There were many thrilling and differing wines in the line ups, one recurring theme however seemed to be the ability of a great terroir to show its true colours after sufficient bottle age even in a year where the vintage characteristics are decidedly dominant. An example of this is 2003. I have been lucky enough to have had some wonderful examples recently of this atypical, heatwave vintage. Terte Roteboeuf being one in addition to a number of 1er Crus from Marquis d'Angerville (there will be more detail in another post soon.) The 2003s in question on this occasion were Cote Blonde from Rostaing and the Fossati Barolo Riserva from Voerzio. The Blonde was bold, opulent and full of violets and youthful fruit whilst offering a distinct stoniness.  The Fossati was the wine of the night. An outstanding mix of perfume, velvet texture, sweet fruit and earthiness with enormous length of flavour, it had more fragrance and finesse than I was expecting from a 2003, remarkable. The other less typical vintage was 1997 in the Mosel. An exciting vintage on release that was less austere than many of its predecessors, concentrated for sure but almost suspiciously easy, fruity and round. Well the Graacher Himmelreich 1997 JJ Prüm had all of these characteristics in spades together with a vivid streak of minerally slate, a beautiful lively and very precise wine that whilst delicious now, still tasted on the young side.

A last minute addition to Germany 2011

I am much looking forward to our German Riesling 2011 tasting & offer next week.  We have delayed the tasting this year until September so that we can show for the first time the Grosse Gewachs and the current JJ Prum vintage (June is always too early for them.)  Another wine got added to the team sheet this week, an uber fine Herrenberg Auslese Fuder 15 2011 from Carl von Schubert of the old monastic Maximin Grunhaus estate in the Ruwer.  It had not been bottled when I visited the estate back in May so I was unable to taste it.  A very different wine to Abtsberg, the redder slate soils make for a less powerful, mineral but finer and fresher Riesling than the grey blue slate of Abtsberg.  They will go shoulder to shoulder next week and should provide a startling contrast to each other.

As usual we will be offering wines from the good and the great of Germany and are particularly pleased to be showing a larger selection of dry Riesling than ever before.

I am excited at the prospect of reacquainting myself with 2011.  My fond memories in May were wines of purity, clarity, less botrytised richness than in most recent vintages but with a great balance between intensity of flavour and feather-weight lightness - this is what makes German Riesling on slate so unique and thrilling.
 

A look back at 96 Barolo & 01 German Riesling

Last week got off to a great start with an invitation I simply could not refuse. A tasting and dinner with friends in the cosy surrounds of the Traveller's club library, the focus of the evening was 1996 Barolo and 2001 Riesling from Germany. These areas being two of my great loves, after Burgundy, I grabbed the chance with both hands.

After a solid, reliable glass of Pol Roger Brut Reserve I attacked a flight of Kabinetts and Spatlesen. The tastebuds were well and truly tantalised, perhaps more than at any other point in the evening. Wehlener Sonnenuhr Kabinett from JJ Prum pleased immediately with its powerful savoury and gold-flecked fruit character, the Spatlese was of course richer but even livelier and beautifully seamless, Muller's Scharzhofberg Spatlese was typically smoky and searingly intense, an electric wine, however the wine of the flight, and indeed the whole evening was Brauneberger Juffer Sonnenuhr Spatlese from Fritz Haag. Though I was not the only one, neither was it everyone's top choice. The extremely high slate content of the vineyard means it won't ever be as forthright and powerful as JJ Prum and Muller's will always be more vital than almost any other Riesling. What the Haag offered, however, was great refinement, beauty and poise. We were lucky enough to continue with the wines over our starter, and it was the only glass I kept going back to.

The next course was a daunting flight of 1996 Barolos. La Serra & Brunate from Marcarini, Bric del Fiasc Scavino, Cannubi Boschis Sandrone, Monprivato G Mascarello, Barolo Falleto di Serralunga red label Giacosa and Barbaresco Santo Stefano Giacosa. 1996 is a vintage I have always loved, its sheer intensity and almost austere classicism but its not for the faint hearted. The wines proved that many 1996s are still babies, so open any you may have with caution (and hearty food!) The Falleto di Serralunga was, sadly, faulty and La Serra impossibly young, the rest, though, did all show glimpses of their excellence. The pick of the bunch for was the Bric del Fiasc, aromatic with a touch of oak and very ripe fruit, it has a sweetness to offset the structure that no other wine quite matched. It was, like the Sandrone, obviously more modern than the other wines but that not to the point of hiding its own unique character, it was just beautiofully crafted and perfectly balanced. Not far behind was the Santo Stefano from Giacosa, still very young, but loaded with fruit and savoury character, bound together by suave, noble tannins.

The (wine part of !) the evening came to a close with Auslese and Goldcap Auslese from JJ Prum and Haag. They were all clearly well crafted and had all of the necessary elements to them, but just seemed to fall a little flat. I felt they were even more adolescent than the 1996 Barolos, to my mind top Auslese only gets really interesting at 15 - 20 years of age, so I am sure more will eventually come from these....

2011 - An extraordinary German Riesling vintage

You have to go back to 1999 to find the last really awkward German vintage, and even then some of the top producers made some good wines. If only Bayern Munich could show such brilliance and consistency, then I would not have been commiserating on Saturday night. But like the 2011 Riesling, I am not bitter.

This run of great German vintages is quite frankly embarrassing. 2011 is yet another. However the growers I met with on my buying trip to Germany last week certainly weren't blushing, they were too delighted with what they had in front of them. Karthauserhof's Christoph Tyrell thinks this will prove to be one of the benchmark vintages in the estate's 200 year history, producing 4 different cuvees each of BA and TBA, something they have never done before. Whilst Helmut Donnhoff considered the quality and health of the grapes "some of the best I have ever seen."

More detail will follow in our German Riesling 2011 offer that will be launched later than usual, in mid September, but in short this was a season that started early and finished as usual at the end of October and beginning of November. The "hang time" was therefore very long, thanks to unseasonably cool wet weather during the summer that slowed down an early Spring. This, the hot September and an October of uninterrupted sunshine have really made the vintage. A potential spanner in the works was hail at the end of August. The stones were reportedly somewhere between golf and tennis ball size but mainly effected roof tops and car windscreens (oh and one of Prum's neighbour's cats.) In the vineyards there was less concern, the stones being big enough to wipe out entire branches or bunches rather than leave individual, rot-inducing split berries on the vines. The fact that dry fine weather immediately ensued also helped to prevent the onset of rot. The Schaefers wryly commented "we had planned to carry out a green harvest at that time, but nature did it for us in the end!"

Growers struggle to compare the wines with other years, 2009 and 2007 being the closest they can get, but I don't feel this really does the 2011s enough justice. Thanks to the hot and sunny end of season this is another "powerful" and ripe vintage like 2009 but the wines are clearly different. For despite, analytically, betraying similar lower than average acidity levels, the wines taste fresh and very mineral. Terroir and vineyard definition are as transparent in the sweeter wines as I can ever remember them being over the last 10 years. The dry, sunny end of season meant that late harvest grapes were either shrivelled without the aid of botrytis or the noble rot that did appear was a very pure dry form. There are some great dry wines, powerful Kabinetts and utterly stunning Spatlesen and Auslesen. The Auslesen and BAs ranked among my favourite wines, though. The lack of traditional noble rot means they are not clouded but heavy honeyed and dried apricot richness, rather they are pure, bright and light in colour, intense - magnified versions of Kabinett and Spatlese. This to me makes it a uniquely German late harvest vintage, where the sweeter wines mix great intensity of flavour with a sublime delicacy. As August Kesseler says, "German Riesling on slate stands for lightness, intensity and drinkability." I could not agree more.

J&B named IWC Specialist German Wine Merchant of the Year.

The German section of our wine list has long been an area very close to our Chairman's heart. Over the past 30 years his love of German Riesling has been transformed into our extensive listings from the Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, The Nahe, Rheingau, Rheinhessen and Franken.

So it was a delight to receive the award for the 2010 Specialist Wine Merchant of the Year. You could say it was just another riesling to be happy...

Mosel Harvest 2009 "Filigree wines"

Mother Nature was on our side in 2009 and blessed us with a wonderful vintage.

After a very cold winter with temperatures as low as -18°C/-0.4°F, the warm and sunny weather of early spring was welcome. It encouraged vegetation and bode well for early blossoming. Although blossoming was actually delayed by cool, damp weather in late May/early June, and it proceeded somewhat slower and more unevenly than originally anticipated, the clusters that developed thereafter were fantastic: small, loose and intensely aromatic.

Summer remained very rainy until August, when friendlier skies reappeared.
In September, sunny and dry weather with cool nights and moderately warm days enabled the grapes to continue developing on the vine calmly and without complications.

Weather permitting, our grapes typically enjoy a very long ripening period – and so it was in 2009. We began harvesting on 13 October. The weather remained stable so that we could take our time to carefully select desirable bunches and bring in the crop in several stages.

Absolutely healthy grapes are essential for producing dry wines with outstanding potential. A selective harvest of ripe, healthy grapes/bunches attacked by noble rot yielded wonderfully fruity wines. In all, our vintage 2009 portfolio will include: juicy, racy “Gutsrieslinge” (our basic estate Rieslings); exceptionally compact Kabinett wines with a fine, fruity acidity; mineral-rich Spätlese and Auslese; and lusciously sweet Beeren- and Trockenbeerenauslese. All will offer great drinking pleasure and have great aging potential.

Once again, we have been able to put together a collection of filigree wines that unite the finest fruity aromas with the slaty mineral notes typical of Brauneberg.

We hope you will truly enjoy tasting the new wines of vintage 2009.

The Haag Family

The Mosel 2009: "Wonderfully Healthy and Golden Yellow in Colour"

We have been busy harvesting for two weeks now. Although we had a few rain showers last week, we are now experiencing a really golden October. It is quite frosty in the mornings but then wonderfully warm and sunny in the afternoons.

Thanks to a very selective harvest, we gain a fantastic quality every day, ranging from Qba through the finest Grand Crus to the Gold Capsule selection.

We have a little less quantity this year however qualitatively this harvest will turn out to be an excellent one.The grapes are wonderful healthy and golden yellow in colour.

We think that it will take us another week to finish a successful harvest.

The Mosel - Fritz Haag's harvest is about to begin.

The grape harvest is now imminent.

The weather in September was very nice and a lot of sunlight made the grapes ripen perfectly.

Small berries, golden yellow coloured, promise to give an excellent vintage. Due to the rainfall during the last days, we have decided to start harvesting this weekend and are pretty excited how the wine will turn out.

Ruwer's 09 Rieslings looking good so far

I was talking to Carl Von Schubert, owner of the Ruwer's Maximin Grunhauser estate, on Friday - fingers crossed but the growing season seems to be progressing nicely in Germany's Ruwer wine region, he commented : "The Riesling grapes in the vineyard are looking great this year. We expect a moderate yield (ca. 45 hl / ha) and there is much optimism for an outstanding quality! Almost every day I go jogging in the vineyards and my little dog and I think that the grapes already taste very aromatic. Luckily there are enough acorns and beech-nuts in the neighbouring forests so I hope that the wild boars won’t concentrate too much on the grapes!

German Riesling 2008

Recently tasting a line up of 2008 German Rieslings has confirmed the thoughts I first formed on my visit to Germany in May. The Kabinetts and Spatleses from the top growers are delicious - crystal clear, racy but by no means aggressive. Great German vintages are often considered to be the ones that, like 2007, have impressively high oeschle levels particularly when lots of goldcap, ba and tba have been made. However, for my own part, I am not sure I wouldn't rather drink the lower oeschle style 2008 Kabinetts and Spatleses which I find much more refreshing than their 2007 predecessors.