Spreitzer Winkeler Jesuitengarten Alte Reben Riesling Feinherb

Score

93

"Predictably, conditions in 2017 only heightened the predilection of fruit Winkeler Jesuitengarten to, as Spreitzer puts it, “be golden yellow one day, violet the next, and spoiled the day after that.” These grapes were clearly caught on the right day this year (which happened to be September 24), and while Andreas Spreitzer can take credit for that choice, he emphasizes that only thanks to an assiduously quality-conscious picking crew with long experience harvesting in this parcel and dispatching rot-affected clusters can such heights as this be achieved. Legally halbtrocken at 14 grams of residual sugar, this wine exhibits the sort of sub-threshold but supportive “hidden” sweetness that can develop a Rheingau Riesling’s flavors and equip it to tackle culinary situations into which analytically dry bottles fear (or at least, should fear!) to tread. Pip-inflected ripe pear is wreathed in faintly decadent gentian and hyacinth, with green herbs adding further bittersweet accents. Piquancy is perfectly placed on the lusciously-fruited, satiny palate to provide stimulating but understated counterpoint, reinforced by tang of pear skin. For a wine this rich and from a site so susceptible to over-ripeness and fungal infection, the superbly-sustained finish is strikingly transparent to floral, herbal and stony nuances. (In some markets, this wine may be labeled “feinherb.”)"