Anyone who was of a ‘drinking age’ (or not quite) in the late 1970s and the 1980s is prone to wince and groan at the mention of ‘riesling’ (the grape variety) or ‘Moselle’ (actually Mosel, an area in Germany that grows a lot of it). The very words instantly evoke memories of labels like Blue Nun, Black Tower, Liebfraumilch – labels we remember as being sweet, cheap and, well, unsophisticated.
By the end of the 1980s, a whole generation of baby boomers had decided that Riesling was very uncool and for the most part, they have never gone back.
But it turns out that an unreconstructed Riesling-phobia is the real sign of an unsophisticated wine palate!
The high profile British wine critic, Jancis Robinson, bemoans Riesling’s reputation, describing it as “the world’s greatest white wine grape”. And she is not alone. Start researching Riesling and you will find an army of wine experts keen to sing the considerable but unrecognised praises of the wine industry’s ugly duckling.
A meeting of fine minds and wines
I admit to no particular expertise when it comes to wines but I was up for the challenge and well, I was very glad I did.
I met one of them just this week. In Oxford, England, for a couple of weeks, I found myself invited to a Riesling tasting evening organised by Green Templeton College’s wine society. The presenter was a conservative looking, bespectacled fellow named Chris Jones – a die-hard Riesling aficionado, with no commercial affiliations of any kind, whose self confessed ambition was to educate the world about the prodigious and underrated charms of Riesling.
I was open to the challenge and in any case, the tasting was being held in the Dining Room of the college, located on the ground floor of the Radcliffe Observatory -the astronomical observatory of the University of Oxford from 1773 until 1934,
I admit to no particular expertise when it comes to wines but I was up for the challenge and well, I was very glad I did. Mr Jones had provided handouts that included not only the names and detailed provenance of the nine wines we were tasting but also some maps of the main Riesling growing areas of the world, and photographs of the grapes at various stages of picking.
Here are some of the things I learned:
- It is pronounced ‘Reece-ling’ – not ‘Reez-ling’
- Riesling has a powerful flavour and is very sensitive to differences in soil and growing conditions. It can exhibit quite substantial changes in flavour from grapes grown “less than a mile apart,” according to our expert.
- Rieslings are definitely not all sweet. Depending on when the grapes are picked, they can be quite dry. As a general rule, the earlier the grape is picked, the dryer it is and the later it is picked, the sweeter or ‘off dry’ it is.
- The aged Rieslings tend to be more expensive because they require more time on the vine and more work maintaining them there. As they wither and shrivel on the vine – hopefully developing the ‘noble’ Botrytis rot – the sugars intensify while the liquid levels reduce. This means you not only get greater sweetness but less yield from pressing the same amount of older grapes.
- Our host described five stages along the ‘sweetness spectrum’, roughly coinciding with the price spectrum:
Kabinett – Just ripe grapes. Refreshing, delicate and aromatic dry wines
Spätlese – Literally “late-harvest,” these are sweeter than Kabinett, often with more acidity.
Auslese – From extra-ripe grapes, this Riesling can be either a dry or a sweet version. This is the stage where the Botrytis rot might have begun.
Beerenauslese (BA) – Intensely sweet . The rot has very much set in. Very much a dessert wine. The labor-intensive winemaking process makes for a high price.
Trockenbeerenauslese (TBA) – Translated as “dry berry select picking”, this is the rarest, sweetest and most expensive of Riesling. These wines are made from grapes after they have shrivelled on the vine and practically become a raisin.
- All Rieslings are very aromatic. Younger, drier Rieslings tend to have more citrus fruit aromas and flavours, while older Rieslings often develop nectarine, apricot, apple and pear aromas. You’ll often smell things like honeycomb too and many aged Rieslings develop a sort of petrol or kerosene aroma.
- Riesling ages well – much better than other white wine varieties and many red varieties. In fact one of the bottles we tasted – the Schwaab-Kiebel Erdener Treppchen Riesling Spätlese from Mosel, Germany (pictured) – was a 1986 vintage and quite delicious.
- Rieslings are traditionally lower in alcohol that other varieties and the general rule is that the sweeter the Riesling, the lower the alcohol level. If the alcohol is 12.5 per cent or higher, the wine will taste dry; at 11 to 12.5 per cent it will show some ‘off-dry’ sweetness; while alcohol that is even lower (especially down around 8 or 9 per cent) will definitely be sweet. We tasted a couple that were 7.5 per cent and 8 per cent respectively.
- Riesling is a cool weather variety. Germany and Alsace in France are traditionally the
My favourite – an Australian drop main producer of Rieslings, although Austria is also a producer. Australia apparently has more Riesling in the ground than any country other than Germany. Excellent Rieslings are also grown in Australia (particularly the Clare, Eden and Barrossa valleys and New Zealand as well as parts of the northern United States
My favourites?
Rolf Binder 2013 Highness Riesling from South Australia’s Eden Valley
Reiffel Brandluft Riesling 2012 from Alsace in France
Dr L Riesling 2014 from Mosel in Germany (Emi Loosen)
Willi Schaefer Graacher Himmelreich Spätlese 2013 from Mosel in Germany
