About one and a half years ago I heard the first time from the online shop Goldrichs, which offered only fruit sweet Rieslings at that time. At that time, I had been asked by Goldrichs if I would like to taste some wines of the assortment and post the tasting in my blog, with which I agreed. This has only been because I found the idea of putting fruity Rieslings in the center of attention worth of support and still find.
There are four different grades of sweetness according to German and EU wine law: dry, semi-dry, semisweet and sweet, in addition, one also finds the term feinherb. A term probably only used in Germany, which should convey to the consumer that the wine has a fine, slightly herb note, even though or just because it is not dry.
In various wine lexica it can be read that a feinherb wine, such as a semi-dry one, has … Read more ...
Maximilian Ferger‘s passion for wine becomes clear if listening to him, the enologist and manager of the renowned winery Wwe. H. Thanisch – Erben Mueller-Burggraef, when he is speaking about his work in the vineyards and in wine cellar.
Talking with him about Riesling and Pinot Noir on the phone, I had the impression that he speaks of the vines as his children. Just as you give children the best you can, in any case, he wants the best for his vines. In doing so, he pursues an ecologically oriented, sustainable path, which also includes the renunciation of herbicides and botryzides – a path that will soon be completed
Around half of the vineyards of the Melsheimer winery in Reil are extremly steep slopes, Mr. Melsheimer senior told us in mid-April this year when he showed us around the winery and brought us closer to history, vineyards and vinification of the Melsheimer winery. There are now many steep slopes on the Moselle, but only 5% of them are among the steepest – with a share of 50% probably a challenge in viticulture. Mr. Melsheimer senior renounced various plant protection products, which his son Thorsten consistently continued, first by converting to ecological, then biodynamic viticulture and then in 2013 finally with the Demeter certification.
Around 3/4 of the slightly more than 11 hectares of vineyards, which all are exclusively planted with Riesling, are in the vineyard Mullay-Hofberg, situated directly above the river Moselle. Their southeast orientation together with the barren slate soil ensure long-lasting, excellent ripening conditions.
Besides excellent dry wines, Hans seems to store an incredible variety of sweet wines in his very well stocked wine cellar. In addition to Auslese, Beeren- and Trockenbeerenauslese, this also includes Late Harvest and Kabinett. At his last wine tasting, after a nice comparative tasting of the 2008 vintage of the Van Volxem estate wines, he presented us a range of cabinet and late harvest wines. These included the Scharzhofberger Riesling Kabinett 2005 from the Egon Müller winery and the … Read more ...