Riesling
2024 Lauer, Peter - Riesling Kabinett Schonfels (750ml)
Here we present the rare Kabinett from the Schonfels vineyard, he only made this for the first time in 2021. Always, always – no matter if this is dry of off dry – you taste the site. Always, always, one of my favorite wines of the vintage.
The Schonfels is one of the most daunting sites of the Saar; under Florian Lauer’s care, it is also becoming one of the most famous sites. While the vineyard has always had a huge reputation, Florian’s father let the site go fallow in the 1980s. The reason? It’s too damn expensive and too difficult and dangerous to farm. The vines here are over 100 years old and ungrafted. Thus, even in good years, the yield is paltry. In addition, because the site is so steep, it is very difficult and very dangerous to farm. In fact, as the site “ends” in a rock face that drops a few hundred feet to a street below, harvesters must be harnessed in, via a carabiner, to a tractor parked at the top of the vineyard. There can be no slipping here; it is truly a matter of life and death.
And while it’s all very easy and dramatic for me to write about this, and while the wine has gone on to become one of the legendary wines of the Saar and of Germany, Florian’s decision, in the late 2000s, to rehabilitate this site was equal parts daring, brilliant, insane, and potentially financially crippling to the estate. The site had been fallow for well over a decade, so it essentially looked like a young forest. Months of (dangerous) work were required to rip out, by hand, most of the wild vegetation, in the hopes that the vines would still be alive. Luckily, they were. And luckily, the reputation of the site has proven itself. But this was a serious, serious gamble. Florian is a boss
-Importer notes (Vom Boden)
2024 Lauer, Peter - Ayler Kupp Riesling Fass 7 Spatlese (750ml)
The same culture, the same fashion and vogue, that has given us treasures like ultra-processed food, congress, social media, and paddle ball is also pushing against wines like Spätlese. Honestly, fuck fashion and vogue. Spätlese as an act of social rebellion? Yes. This is so damn crisp it’ll shut the haters up – just under seventy grams of beautiful, beautiful fructose (that’s less than many Kabinett) and damn near 10 grams of acid to make your palate reverberate.
-Importer notes (Vom Boden)
2023 Maximin Grunhauser Abtsberg Kabinett Riesling (750ml)
The 2023 Riesling Maximin Grünhäuser Abstberg Kabinett presents wet slate on the nose, followed by lemon and a tropical hint of passionfruit. The palate bursts with vivid juiciness, featuring ripe melon, juicy mandarin and yellow peach, all heightened ...
2020 Muller, Egon - Scharzhofberger Spatlese
The 2020 Riesling Scharzhofberger Spätlese A.P. #6 reflects numerous parcels and pickings with largely healthy fruit but slight botrytis influence. Quince and white peach hover between fresh and jellied, overlain with heady, musky perfume of peony and ...
2020 Muller, Egon - Scharzhofberger Qba
An off-dry riesling beauty with very attractive white-flower and white-fruit aromas, a hint of green-apple freshness lifting the medium-bodied palate. Precise balance at the long, clean finish. Drink or hold.
1997 Nikolaihof - Riesling Vinothek Severin Fass
The 1997 Riesling Vinothek Severin Fass was aged for 25 years in a large, traditional oak cask (filtered, though not on the lees) and opens with an intense yet pure, fresh and spicy, finely oaky bouquet with a deep, mineral tone of crushed stones. On the ...
2002 Nikolaihof - Riesling Vinothek
From the Im Weingebirge single vineyard, the 2002 Riesling Vinothek has been aged slightly filtered and sulfured for 16 years in a 6,000-liter oak cask. Bottled in July 2018, the brilliantly white-golden colored wine is fascinatingly clear and bright on t...
2017 Pewsey Vale - Riesling Eden Valley The Contours (750ml)
The 2017 Riesling The Contours is building nicely in the bottle with honeyed limes and gentle, toasty tones now lifting floral and citrus aromas. Acidity is fresh and well-integrated, drinking close to peak but has the balance and purity to be enjoyabl...
2023 FX Pichler Riesling Ried Kellerberg Smaragd (750ml)
The 2023 Riesling Kellerberg has immense and fragrant freshness, almost of Seville orange and distinct notions of crushed citrus foliage. The palate is taut and has lots of tension but shimmers with tangerine peel amidst all this brightness. The 2023 i...
2023 FX Pichler Riesling Ried Steinertal Smaragd (750ml)
The 2023 Riesling Steinertal is from high parcels in the Steinertal, close to the woods. Lemon and lemon leaf are pure and fragrant on the nose. This is whip-smart, slender and so perfumed. It is wonderfully clean cut, ripe and smooth in its lemony bri...