When I was in Austria over a yr ago, I developed a grudging appreciation for schilcher wine of West Steiermark.
Not a profound wine, but w/ the right foods…pretty tasty.
kinda curious why that kind of wine has not been replicated in Calif or elsewhere in the USofA.
Other than the fact that there is no Blauer Wildbacher grown here. And I have no idea what the varietal
character of Wildbacher is like. But I think that using Carignane or Zinfandel, that wine could be
replicated here in this country. It’ll not set the wine world on fire, though.
Tom
Well, Blauer Wildbacher is very tart, crunchy, somewhat aromatic and very high-acid variety with somewhat pale color, so your variety suggestions for alternatives sound a bit odd, to say the least. I suppose the resulting wines would be deeply colored, high in alcohol, low in acidity and full of ripe fruit - exactly the polar opposite of Schilcher.
Basically Schilcher is nothing more than a rosé wine made from Blauer Wildbacher. You have rosés there across the pond, and those might be the closest approximation of the style. If you want to make actual Schilcher there, the first thing to do would be planting Blauer Wildbacher.
Perhaps making rosé wine from very high-acid varieties in cooler regions where the varieties struggle to ripen just enough would be the next closest thing.
I love the real thing with fried chicken. My Chef partner did a fried quail dish with a fruit compote paired with one that was killer for a wine dinner.
As Otto notes, I suspect tou’d have to harvest Carignane and Zinfandel super early to get something approximating what Blauer Wildbacher does in Austria.
I assume this was over in Austria, Jim??
My impression is that Wildbacher is a rather coasre red on it’s own.
Maybe this could be a higher calling for BacoNoir or Chancellor??
Tom
You cannot “replicate” a wine with different varieties … (in different terroir/climate)! You probably can try to produce something “similar” …
As already written above the “Blauer Wildbacher” is a red grape with very high acidity, with quite thick dark skins, with aromas of dark cherries, dark berries (cassis) and quite spicy …
a speciality of Styria (Steiermark) in Austria.
Usually vinified as rosé wine (–> Schilcher), but also as red wine, AND (imho the best solution) as sparkling wine (Schilcher Sekt).
I´m absolutely no fan of Schilcher (or Blauer Wildbacher) - it´s a “simply” wine, neither noble nor ageworthy … but quite tasty with the local food … very on the rustic side …
There are so many “better” wines in Austria, I see no necessity to buy or order it, I´d always prefer a Sauvignon blanc, a Morillon, Pinot blanc, Welschriesling … or a Zweigelt when red is recommended.
Yeah, but the problem is that these are varieties that need a lot of warmth and they ripen rather late, so if you’d pick them at the acidity levels of Blauer Wildbacher, you’d have no fruit flavors but only green, vegetal notes. Even if you’d pick the grapes as soon as they’d be physiologically just ripe for earlier possible harvest, they’d still be fruitier and lower in acidity. This is the problem when trying to replicate cooler-climate varieties with warmer-climate ones.
Usually dry and very tart. Occasionally made into a sparkling wine - for example Strohmeier makes ridiculously fine examples of this Schilchersekt.
Agree, Gerhard…not wanting to replicate Schilcher exactly as in Steiermark, just something similar in
style as Schilcher.
I first had Schilcher in Graz w/ Wolfgang & Bettina at a restaurant. Before that, I’d never heard
of it. Wolfgang ordered me a glass to try. The look on his face was priceless…like he’d really
pulled one on me. I had it w/ your spreadable lard (whatever it’s called), and actually thought it was pretty
good…nothing profound…but it just went well. Maybe it was just the magic of dining in Graz!!
As you describe Wildbacher, I think maybe some of our hybrid grapes, perhaps as grown in Upstate NY
or Michigan or Minnesota or Ontario. Things like BacoNoir or Chancellor are thick skinned, high acidity,
kinda rough/coarse. Maybe not so aromatic, though. But Schilcher may be the highest calling
for those grapes in those regions. Not to worry…they’re not going to bring the Steiermark Schilcher
industry to its knees.
If I recall right, they still grow a fair amount of French/American hybrids there in the Steiermark?
Tom
Not many in the Steiermark, except for table-grapes …
Much more in Burgenland - the “Uhudler” is a rosé wine made as a cuvée from hybrid grapes …
(no, it´s not a good wine …)
Gerhard,
I made my own expression of Verhackertes last weekend. To tell the truth, it came out pretty good.
Lacks the terroir of good Graz Verhackertes, though!!!
But I’d much rather be having it in Graz. Washed down with Schilcher…mmmmm…life doesn’t get any better.
Tom
