Thanks to the discussion on Bueker’s recent thread about Austrian wines and how rarely we drink them despite the high quality I felt almost obligated to open something Austrian. I haven’t drunk too much Ott in my time but I think I’ve enjoyed them all thus far. This is very likely the best one I’ve had, a serious Grüner with great aging potential and offering lots of pleasure already. And, most importantly, just massively interesting stuff.
2017 Bernhard Ott Grüner Veltliner 1ÖTW Rosenberg- Austria, Niederösterreich, Wagram (24.10.2020)
Pretty damn classic on the nose with yellow apple, grapefruit, white pepper, crushed rock, sponti funk and floral tones. Tangy, bright and supremely expressive, radiating from the glass like sunshine. On the palate medium-bodied with very nice richness to it, this makes quite a quick impact with its texture. The acidity is absolutely on point, giving the wine a strong core and nice lift and even a slightly spritzy quality. Early on it came off a bit ripe, sweetish even, but soon it toned down to something much more harmonious. Pretty firm with wonderful focus, there is nothing fat or clumsy here. It gets less fruit-forward and more stony and minerally by the minute, which I find both fascinating and positively surprising. Wow, this is super delicious with a great style to boot.
Thanks, Ilkka. I don’t know why these wines don’t get more love (record skip).
I had the pleasure of tasting the 2017 lineups at 8 famous Austrian domaines during a visit in 2018. Ott was the best of the bunch.
They make almost exclusively gv but I just opened their one riesling earlier this week; the 2017 Feuersbrunn. It’s priced in the mid-$20s here and was intensely enjoyable and stuffed for the long haul.
Ott’s quality is consistently outstanding from the basic wines through the Erste Lagen. The Erste Lagen can and do hold their own against Wachau Smaragde and are very fairly priced for the quality. Great wines! (I have never had the Tausend Rosen, nor his amphora experiments), but I can recommend everything else!
I posted some takeaways from the trip in an Austria thread at the time; here’s a link.
It doesn’t include tasting notes. As I recall, many of the 2017s were in the 13.5-14% alc range and were showing it at the time. Ott was an exception to this. (Being outside Wachau, they don’t have to deal with the classification nonsense.)
I haven’t done any re-tasting of the 17s and have been buying all of the 13s and 15s that I can find. I’m curious to know if there any Austrian vintages post-2015 that people are excited about.
Btw, I see now that Ott has done a few other riesling bottlings from time to time. I will be looking out for them.
Disappointing to hear about the lofty alcohol levels but that’s the reality we are living in now. Yesterday’s bottle had 13% ABV but indeed the ripeness was only evident for a short time in the beginning before it toned down.
As listed on his website, all of the current vintages of Ott’s wine’s are 13% or less, except for “Der Ott,” which is listed at 13.5%. He does not list alc. for “Tausend Rosen,” which I suspect is supposed to be an extra rich version, so that may be higher. At any rate, Ott’s wine are indeed generally less alc. than most of the big name Smaragde of the Wachau, which technically begin above 12.5% but today are often 13.5-14.5% for most producers.
Yes. Sorry. You were clear. I do agree with Ilkka that alc. levels are creeping up all over. I was at a very large tasting of GVs last year with most of the major estates (one missing was Hirtzberger) and, for my palate, the best wines were from Ott and Prager.
Hi Joe, been looking to get into Austrian whites and as many (including the other contributors in this thread) have mentioned, 13 is a great vintage that I have dipped my toes into. Just curious as to why you put 15s in the same category as from my impression it was a bigger, riper vintage which made me hesitate on pulling the trigger for any 15s! Cheers.
