I’d like to hear about people’s experience with the so-called “sponti” funk found in some Rieslings. I’ve been disheartened in opening two recent 2022s from Schloss Lieser and Hermann Ludes to find extraordinarily persistent eggy character on the nose. When I say persistent, I mean repeated splash decanting over 24 hours did not resolve the problem. I even brought a sample into my lab the next day and added some copper sulfate, which did, ultimately, clear things up. Whew. That’s a lot.
I’ve been drinking German Riesling - and young German Riesling, at that - pretty regularly for 15 years or so, and have rarely encountered this problem across a couple dozen producers. I’ve encountered high SO2 in JJ Prum, but in the 10-15 bottles I’ve had I’ve only encountered high molecular SO2, which smells very distinctive, and nothing else - though I understand from others that Prum has this “sponti” sometimes. The only other producer I can think of where I’ve seen this more than once is Heymann-Lowenstein. This was my first experience with both Schloss Lieser and Hermann Ludes.
So my questions to you all are these:
- Do you find certain producers to have this fairly regularly? If so, which?
- For those with experience aging these wines, does this funk go away over time? Do other sulfidey aromas come to the fore?
- Does anyone know why this happens in particular with Riesling? I have no experience working with Riesling myself so am very curious.
I’ve read this @Lars_Carlberg article and found it interesting. Ulli Stein seems to indicate that this is purely reduction during fermentation, which makes sense to me, but I wonder why this is so often an issue with Riesling? High use of elemental sulfur in the vineyard? Extremely low-oxygen vinification? Again, this is a grape and a winemaking style I am wholly unfamiliar with and I would love some perspective from those more familiar than I.
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Thanks for the shout-out. If you read the comments below my article, they answer most of your questions.
Non scientific answers to your questions
It does happen more with some producers, Schafer-Frohlich used to be known for it but recent vintages have not been too bad which suggests winemaking is a big cause.
It definitely goes away with age and almost always blows off with time in the bottle and usually for me a decant. I am surprised your two examples did not resolve over 24 hours.
I don’t know the technical answer but yes it is most common in riesling and my guess it has to do with the chemical compounds in rieslings.
And one other thing to note is that Ludes is under screwcap which could have been a factor here.
Thanks Lars. My experience with reductive fermentations is that they are usually associated with one or more of: too little nitrogen, too much nitrogen, too little pantothenic acid, too little oxygen, or too much residual elemental sulfur on the grapes. With these Rieslings, am I right to understand that some of these grapes come in nitrogen-deficient? And do you know what the use of elemental sulfur is like in these vineyards?
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My pleasure, Ben. Those are good questions. Unfortunately, I don’t have the answers.
Respect.
Did this convert your wine into this?
Love both sponti-funk on new bottles, and petrol on old(er), but not Brett on reds. Go figure.
In one of my comments below the article, I wondered if the combination of a low pH and, for example, a reductive fermentation in a stainless-steel tank accentuates the stink. There are producers who have wines with an extremely low pH and ferment with ambient yeasts, but they don’t have the severe stink—namely, Hofgut Falkenstein, where I work. But the Webers also use lower amounts of sulfur and ferment in old oak casks. They also bottle their wines under natural cork.
Here’s a short list of producers whose wines sometimes have a noticeable sponti stink: Joh. Jos. Prüm, von Othegraven, Schloss Lieser, Maximin Grünhaus, Vols, Hermann Ludes, Nik Weis, and Schäfer-Fröhlich.
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Although Ulli Stein rules out that the slate soils, which have a low pH, play a role in contributing to the stink, Peter Liem notices it with wines grown on slate soils and fermented by ambient yeasts.
Felseneck and Bockstein, for example, are quartz-rich slate slopes. Schäfer-Fröhlich and Nik Weis make sponti wines from Felseneck and Bockstein, respectively.