Mosel for Dummies

WINE TALK
1

Hello
I’d really appreciate it if you could provide me with a bit of background on the wines of the Mosel. I have enjoyed quite a few starting about four years ago, but have yet to pursue delving in deeper. I wish I could remember the bames if those that I have loved but decided I would circle back later. It would be great to know a bit more from those on this forum to supplement my own random studies.

First, a few basic questions:

  1. Terroir breakdowns by region, any way to decode a few of the areas while understanding that the complexity of the individual sites might make this a list of exceptions?

  2. Geological differences in different areas

  3. Old Vines, which solid producers are known to separate them from the younger vines?

  4. Is there a traditional/modern aspect in the region? What are some of the details? Oak, fermentation vessels, elevage, battonage, MLF or lack of, etc? If so, who are the traditionalists and why would you label them so?

  5. Any old timers that I need to search out quickly before they retire?

  6. Last 12-15 Vintages. General thoughts?

  7. Vineyard Classifications?

  8. Types of wines/cepages?

  9. Last high watermark vintages in last 40 years?

  10. Excellent producers that are not producing currently?

  11. Producers that have had excellent reputations but have hit large rough patches?



    Thanks again…
    [cheers.gif]

2

Ray, I am not far ahead of you in the learning curve but my few years of learning about the region have largely benefited from John Gilman. I would suggest you get in touch with him, he is incredibly versed on the region, the terroir, the wine makers, the vintages, etc. I am sure you are aware, but for those reading who might not be, you can access his archive of articles through cellar tracker if you are both a member of cellar tracker and a current subscriber (you can have an abonnement for 2011 and read the archives from 2004 even if you didn’t subscribe in 2004). Also, David Clark in MSD seemed to be very interested in Mosel wines and had made a trip to the region within the last few years. He could be an interesting person to discuss this topic with over a beer.

3

Here’s a great thread on favorite German wine regions and why. It’s a good overview of the regions and styles.

there’s so much to know about Mosel wines, and there are so many german wine experts on these boards.
If you’re interested, I did a write-up about about my trip to the Mosel Valley in October… here…

4

A few quickie responses:

  1. Terroir breakdowns by region, any way to decode a few of the areas while understanding that the complexity of the individual sites might make this a list of exceptions?
    –The Saar and Ruwer are cooler and tend to have markedly higher acid profiles than wines from the Mosel Valley proper.

  2. Old Vines, which solid producers are known to separate them from the younger vines?
    –Van Volxem in the Saar labels some bottlings as “Alte Reben” but that’s the only case I can think of that in the Mosel-Saar-Ruwer. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of emphasis on this.

  3. Is there a traditional/modern aspect in the region? What are some of the details? Oak, fermentation vessels, elevage, battonage, MLF or lack of, etc? If so, who are the traditionalists and why would you label them so?
    –Compared to other regions, the traditional/modernist divide doesn’t really exist, to my knowledge. (Footnote: Van Volxem, who makes his wines mostly dry, claims to be preserving a traditional style and contends that everyone else succumbed to a post WWII fad for sweet wines.)

  4. Any old timers that I need to search out quickly before they retire?
    –Can’t think of any. The children seem to be taking over a high proportion of the best estates.

  5. Last 12-15 Vintages. General thoughts?
    –The quick answer: An astonishing number of good vintages, though in different styles, and with more or less (or no) botrytis.

  6. Vineyard Classifications?
    –You need a PhD to understand those.

  7. Types of wines/cepages?
    –Mostly 100% riesling.

  8. Last high watermark vintages in last 40 years?
    –Many candidates.

5

Ray,

I don’t have time for a lenghty post right now, but if you are interested in old vines (and with the prevalence of fleurbereiningung you should be), then you can also look to Meulenhof, who now bottle some ‘Alte Reben’ wines from old vine plots that were not grubbed up and replated in the vineyard reorganizaitons. Also seek out J. J. Christoffel wines - lots of old, ungrafted vines for virtually all of their wines. Schmitt-Wagner retired, but Carl Loewen is producing wines from the Longuicher Maximiner Herrenberg vineyard that is very, very old, ungrafted vines. As far as old timers, seek out some of the wines from the Merkelbach brothers. They make very old school wines that are just a joy to drink - not profound, but joyful.

As far as vintages, I am especially partial to 2001. 1971 is still the benchmark since the introduction of the German Wine Law (or joke depnding on your sentiments). I have found any number of distracting extremes in the last 6-8 vintages - balance has been largely been lacking IMO. I’ll take virtually anything from 2001 (or even 2002) over most of what’s come since. That’s not a common view, but the more I drink from the earlier 2 years the less I like the more recent handfull.

6

Ray, call Jeremy and tell him you are ready to surrender yourself to the joys of mosel rieslings. I’m sure he’d be happy to tutor you a bit.

Also - Becky and Russell love German riesling and in addition to what they already were cellaring, I provided them with a couple of cases this past summer and I’m sure Russell would love to open one or more to share with you.

7

We once had Terry Theise as a guest on the site. I’m sure there’s an archive of it. I’m psyched to hear DB’s enthusiasm for '01. My first vintage I bought a couple cases and still have most of it. Can’t wait to dig into some JJ Prum/Christoffel & Muller Cs.

8

Ray, I’d get an appointment with Johannes Selbach, have him drive you up into his vineyards. He’ll be able to answer a lot of your questions, and refer you to some other producers to visit.

I know you are a student of wine, and it doesn’t hurt to be prepared and educate yourself, but don’t take it too far :wink: Just go and absorb the majesty of the place and its wines, you really can’t go far wrong in any direction.

Do you have a copy of a recent edition of Terry Theise’s German catalog?

And David’s advice above is excellent. The one producer I would try to get to see is Willi Schaefer.

Cheers!

9

For this I’d really advise going through Terry Theise’s catalogs. Terry discusses a lot of the differences in soil/flavours for many of the top sites and the regions in general.
Jean Fisch and David Rayer’s Mosel Fine Wines (free) publication is also terrific for getting into some of these nuances.

  1. Old Vines, which solid producers are known to separate them from the younger vines?

Knebel (Winninger Bruckstuck), von Beulwitz (Kaseler Nies’chen), Meulenhof (Erdener Treppchen), Markus Molitor and Van Volxem (various vineyards) from recent experience.
As David said Schmitt-Wagner and Christoffel don’t make additional ‘old vine’ bottlings, but most of their holdings are (were in CSW’s case) incredibly old, often ungrafted vines. Peter Lauer’s another with old ungrafted vines in various parcels.

  1. Is there a traditional/modern aspect in the region? What are some of the details? Oak, fermentation vessels, elevage, battonage, MLF or lack of, etc? If so, who are the traditionalists and why would you label them so?

Two different ‘traditional’ approaches - one is the ‘classic’ Mosel sweeter style Kabinett/Spatlese/etc that the likes of Prum, Schaefer, etc do so well. The majority of the traditional producers here use old fuders, zero MLF and often native yeasts.
The other traditional approach is the one that the likes of Steinmetz, Lauer, Immich-Batterieberg and a few others (mostly in the Mosel Wine Merchant portfolio, but Van Volxem also does this) use - relatively light wines, but much drier than the Kabinett/Spatlese, and more in line with what Mosel Riesling apparently was in the early part of the 20th C. I’m not as well informed on this as some, hopefully Lars Carlberg, Claude Kolm or Dan Melia (if Dan reads the board) will chime in.

  1. Last 12-15 Vintages. General thoughts?

Echo David’s thoughts on 2001. Glorious, glorious wines.

2002 and a lot of 2004s are also quite lovely. 05s are a bit richer, but there are some wonderful Spatlese and Auslese. 2006 is great for bargain dessert wines, as a whole lot of Kabinett/Spatlese is basically bargain Auslese or richer.
I am also a huge fan of 1998 - probably my favourite vintage after 2001, with some wonderful, elegant Spatlese and Kabinetts.
2008 is excellent as well - lighter than many other recent vintages with really bright, clear fruit and nice acid spines. Lots of Kabinett and bright, pure Spatlese.

  1. Excellent producers that are not producing currently?

Dunno about ‘excellent’, but Bert Simon stopped making wine in the Saar a few years ago.

10

Ray – When it comes to vintages, there are many more dimensions to the issue in Germany because you have the overlay of the Praedikats, and not just terroir and the season. In 2002, for instance, the lower level wines like QbA and Kabinett were the real standouts, where as in 2006 (a miserably wet summer), the real peaks were in the botrytised wines. So if you prefer Auslese, say, the choice of vintage may be quite different than if you choose Kabinett.

11

Thank you for all the responses, everyone has been really helpful. I have a bunch of homework to do. I’ll be putting together a trip to the region over the next few weeks. Looks like it is only 4 hours away. Could be a nice weekend getaway, especially once I know more.

I should have brought this up to Claude while he was out here, but I’ll be sure to bug J Gilman about it when I see him. So, just to mark this thread with a small data point. For still wines, I have about .5 bottles of white wine for every 100 bottles of local reds in my personal cave. I imagine this may adjust °somewhat° in the near future.

As for vineyards, which vineyards have a reputation for delivering unique expressions of terroir? Any specific vineyards which are considered remarkable in this context?

[cheers.gif]

12

Remarkable vineyards - tons of them, but I will set out a few. One thing you have to understand is that in 1971 when the bulk of the current German Wine Law was put into effect, there was an expansion of many famous sites. This has made it more important to have a little insider knowledge to seek out producers with holdings in the original heart of those sites. Of course global warming is floating all boats to a degree, which makes some “lesser” plots more capable of producing high level spatlese and auslese.

Anyway…so much to say, but here’s a starting point:

Scharzhofberg (in the Saar…remember that Mosel used to be Mosel-Saar-Ruwer) - Egon Muller’s bottlings are perhaps the pinnacle of “green bottle” Riesling (Almost all Mosel Rieslings come in green bottles.). Other producers (von Hovel, Kesselstatt, etc) make wine from this site, but none approach Muller.

Wehlener Sonnenuhr (middle Mosel) - J. J. Prum has the best holdings in this site, and the wines display a very specific flavor profile, especially in less globally warm years. It’s like lemon cream over apple and rocks to me. Many other procuers make very good wines from this site, but Prum is the top.

Maximin Grunhaus Herrenberg and Abstberg (Ruwer) - monopoles of Carl von Schubert, an icon of the region. Through the mid-90s was at the very top of the heap in the region, but to some folks this estate slipped form 1999 to about 2005. I happen to love the 2001s from here, and find that the Grunhaus (as people commonly call the estate) retains an elegance that has been somewhat lost in the warmer years of the last decade or so. Even the lower level bottlings from here can profit from decades in the cellar. I am just now really getting into my kabinetts from the early/mid '90s, and auslese from the '80s still needs time.

Erdener Pralat (middle Mosel) - Dr. Loosen has the choice portion of this site and makes gold capsule auslese that is much more ripe in its fruit profile than is the norm on the Mosel. It’s a heat trap which used to be more important than it is now.

Piesporter Goldtropfchen (middle Mosel) - Nearly had its reputation destryed by oceans of Piesporter Michelsberg, but the wines from this site made by Rheinhold Haart are some of the greatest in the Mosel. Honeyed peach is the thing than comes to mind when I have Goldtropchen (golden droplets) wines. St. Urbans-Hof makes lovely wines from here as well.

Some producers are (quasi-legally) making wines identified by specific historical plots (i.e. vineyard names that are no longer officially recognized). Selbach-Oster’s Zeltinger Sonnenuhr ‘Rotlay’, Zeltinger Himmelreich ‘Anrecht’ and Zeltinger Schlossberg ‘Schmitt’ are three examples of wines made from a specific parcel that is block picked (versus selected harvesting), and really shows off the terroir of the site and the overall vintage. Others are doing similar things.

This could go on for a bit, but I’ll let others add more for now.

13

Ray: I’d recommend David Schildknecht’s intro to Germany in Parker’s Wine Buyer’s Guide N°7 and Joachim Krieger’s essay titled “The Mosel: Taking the Long View.” Dan Melia’s translation makes it a great read.

Many are fans of Terry Theise and his catalogs. He’s a talented writer for sure. I don’t agree with some of his opinions, but I liked his book, which was published last year.

  1. Terroir breakdowns by region, any way to decode a few of the areas while understanding that the complexity of the individual sites might make this a list of exceptions?

The Mosel Wine Merchant (MWM) overview answers your question quite well.

  1. Geological differences in different areas

Ditto.

  1. Old Vines, which solid producers are known to separate them from the younger vines?

It’s much like vieilles vignes in France. You should check out the MWM glossary. We defined a number of terms, such as alte Reben.

Several producers on the Mosel use “Alte Reben” on their label, yet there are many who have old vines that don’t indicate this.

Van Volxem’s “Alte Reben” (“Old Vines”) isn’t even their oldest vines. These are important for some of their top single-vineyard wines.

  1. Is there a traditional/modern aspect in the region? What are some of the details? Oak, fermentation vessels, elevage, battonage, MLF or lack of, etc? If so, who are the traditionalists and why would you label them so?

Joachim Krieger tackles this issue in his essay.

The Fuder is the traditional cask of the Mosel.

I cannot answer your other points at this time.

  1. Any old timers that I need to search out quickly before they retire?

As David M. Bueker pointed out, you should try the wines from Alfred Merkelbach. They’re two bachelors, gentle and modest, who make “old-style” Mosel Riesling (i.e., from the 1960s, '70s, and '80s). I recently enjoyed tasting their 2010s and visited them in the mid-nineties with a friend who knows them well. I’d also recommend Kajo Christoffel of Jos. Christoffel jr. Both estates focus on the so-called classic sweeter wines from stopped fermentations, the latter exclusively with ambient-yeast fermentations. This isn’t the Mosel wines of yore, however. And many traditional producers (Stein, Maximin Grünhaus) keyed on drier styles, as well. The Mosel’s fame wasn’t about sweet or dry. The former didn’t even exist as we now know it, and the wines rarely had so much residual sugar as nowadays. It’s a taste preference. For many (including the producers themselves), the “classic” Mosel wines should be light and fruity (sometimes nobly) sweet à la J.J. Prüm, Weiser-Künstler, Willi Schaefer, Egon Müller, or Geltz-Zilliken. (Several of the aforementioned, benchmarks for this style, make good dry and off-dry wines, too.) The region’s greatness, however, was about aromatics, breed, and delicacy. The wines of the late 19th century (the Mosel’s heyday) were gluggable and tended to be dry (think Muscadet), sometimes off-dry (such as a Vouvray demi-sec or sec tendre).

  1. Last 12-15 Vintages. General thoughts?

There are plenty of good vintages over this period. I especially like 2008.

  1. Vineyard Classifications?

The Mosel region has many great vineyards. Climate change has adversely affected some of the top sites that are drought prone. There is no official classification, even though the VDP (see glossary) is classifying their members’ sites.

  1. Types of wines/cepages?

See Mosel overview.

I’ll leave the other questions for now, as I don’t have the time.

14

Thank you very much, Lars! Truly interesting history there. I’m reading the first linked page now.

[cheers.gif]

15

By the way Ray - most producers are very happy to show you the cellars and speak about their winemaking methods. J. J. Prum is the one place where basically nobody is allowed in the cellars (unless something has changed…and I don’t think it has).

16

Thanks, Dave. Good to know. Do many sell the lower production bottles to visitors?

17

Didn’t you see the news about Ray and JJ Prum, David?

“Burgundy vigneron conquers the Mosel! Dr. Prum says, ‘he’s such an inspiration, I must take him under my wing!’”

18

Ray, I would also add that you not forget the Nahe. Not much further as the crow flies, but I couldn’t speak to driving there. One or two good producers there :wink:

19

Ray,

As I have said many times before to you, the first key is to come to DC and drink German wines (and Burgundy) with us.

  1. Terroir breakdowns by region, any way to decode a few of the areas while understanding that the complexity of the individual sites might make this a list of exceptions?

I am not an expert on terroir other than by taste, but I think the broadest distinctions are between the between the Saar and Ruwer on one hand and the middle mosel on the other hand. The Saar and the Ruwer generally are colder regions and have higher acidity than the Mosel. These wines are great in warmer vintages like 1989 that might be a bit soft in the Mosel. There is another region called the Upper Mosel, but that is for the more advanced class.

My favorite producer in the Ruwer is von Schubert (Maximin Grunhaus). In the Saar, the superstar producer is Egon Muller, who makes the Romanee Conti of the Saar, his Schwartzhofberger. But the Saar producer I probably drink the most wines from is Zilliken.

The Mosel can be divided into sections. Four of the more well-known are Piesport. The best producer IMHO is Rheinhold Haart. [Note if you go to Germany, Charles is friends with Haart and Zilliken.] The best vineyard is Piesporter Goldtropchen. Note I do not spelll German well.

A second region to me would be Brauneberg and Bernkastel. Bernkasteler Doktor is probably the most famous vineyard from the this area. I don’t drink a lot of wines from this area but an excellent producer is Fritz Haag.

I love the wines from the Wehlen, Zelting, Graach stretch. Love Prum, Selbach, Schaeffer, etc. I have more wines from JJ Prum than any other German wine producer. In running for Wehlener Sonnenuhr, don’t forget Zeltinger Sonnenuhr, an equally great vineyard (try Selbach).

My fourth area is Erden and Urzig. Three great, great vineyards - Urziger Wurzgarten, Erdener Treppchen and Erdener Pralat. Excellent producers include Dr. Loosen, Christoffel and Merkelbach.


4) Is there a traditional/modern aspect in the region? What are some of the details? Oak, fermentation vessels, elevage, battonage, MLF or lack of, etc? If so, who are the traditionalists and why would you label them so?

I don’t think this is as big a deal as elsewhere. I think of more “modern” practices in Germany is wine making where the wines see either a lot less oxygen than elsewhere (see Muller-Catoir, esp. their retired winemaker Hans Gunther Schwartz) or more oxygen than normal. Both of these are more in the Pfaltz than in the Mosel. The other big trend is dry wines. Again that is more in other regions than the Mosel.

  1. Last 12-15 Vintages. General thoughts?

I like acid and so am a huge fan of the 1990s. A lot of people love 2001, but while I like them, I have found too many wines a bit soft. 2005 and 2007 are great vintages, esp. 2007. But I love a lot of German vintages and have really liked a somewhat mediocre vintage, 2008 because the style is very precise. The one 2010 I have had, a Gold Capsule Auslese from Schloss Lieser was just absolutely fantastic.

  1. Vineyard Classifications?

See my thoughts above.

  1. Types of wines/cepages?

A lot of German wine regions make excellent wines from a lot of grapes. In the Mosel, stick to Riesling. I don’t think dry wines are as successful in the Mosel as elsewhere, but I love offdry Kabinetts and Spatlesen. And the sweet stuff can be mindblowing.

  1. Last high watermark vintages in last 40 years?

1971, 1975, 1990.

The two best wine writers doing Germany are David Schildknecht and John Gilman. I should say that a lot of my German wine education came from David when he was in retail here. My guess is that the same is true for a lot of DC German wine lovers including Maureen and Charles.

20

Assuming you mean “sell,” yes, most do. You’ll be astonished by the length of their lists – scores of wines in many cases, with back vintages.

I should add that, after traveling pretty extensively in the wine regions of France, Italy and Germany, and a little in Spain, nowhere have I been treated better than in Germany.

You definitely should drive up the Saar and Ruwer, which are very different from the Mosel Valley itself. The Mosel is a monoculture world, with the slopes solidly covered in vines. In the other two valleys (more rolling hills in the case of the Saar), the vines are intermingled with forests and fields.

And make some time for Trier, which was the capital of the Roman colony of the Rhine, and has an ampitheater, baths, the Roman Emperor’s throne room and the largest preserved Roman city gate in Europe. If that weren’t enough historical significance, it was Karl Marx’s home town.