Alsace: The 2014s and Late-Release 2013s

Alsace is home to the best Gewürztraminers on the planet and Rieslings that are among the finest anywhere. The region also excels with a unique style of Pinot Gris that is quite unlike any other, with rich, opulent, mostly dry wines that feature strong aromas of tropical fruits, honey and mushrooms. All three varieties also produce what are some of the world's most profound late-harvest sweet wines. As if that weren’t enough, this beautiful, welcoming growing region also offers crystalline Sylvaners, aromatic Muscat wines, spicy Auxerrois and a host of ever-improving sparkling Crémants and Pinot Noirs.

Moreover, Alsace’s wines have no peers when it comes to compatibility with a range of ethnic cuisines. These are wines that match well with the likes of Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean and other Asian creations the way that Chardonnays and Sauvignon Blancs only wish they did. Unfortunately, a look at sales of Alsace wines in the U.S. shows that not everybody shares my enthusiasm for these magnificent wines. Interestingly, this is not the case in other countries, such as Italy, where the popularity of Alsace’s best bottlings remains high, if not quite at the level of Champagne or Burgundy. Wine lovers have come to appreciate the rich textures and very pure aromas and flavors offered by Alsace’s top efforts, but until recently the region’s wines were handicapped by rather generous levels of residual sugar in even purportedly dry wines, which could make purchasing them tricky for consumers. Happily, Alsace wines are now drier and fresher than they were just a decade ago. Moreover, most estates have taken to using a 1 to 5 sweetness scale on their back labels (where 1 represents driest and 5 sweetest); although not all producers are enthusiastic about this novel idea, this system is very consumer-friendly.

A view over the town of Kaysersberg, which translates into the “Mountain of the Emperor”

Another very positive recent decision by the ODG de l’AVA (Organization de Défense et de Gestion de l’Association des Viticulteurs d’Alsace) has been to officially authorize the use of the word “sec” (dry) on back labels when the wine is truly dry. By European Union rules, this means less than 5 grams per liter of residual sugar or up to 9 grams per liter of r.s. provided that the wine has at least 7 g/l of total acidity, which is a level high enough to effectively make the wine taste dry. This decision, to be implemented as of 2016, will effectively eliminate from the shelves all those Alsace wines that have previously been sold as dry even though they might carry as much as 20 grams of residual sugar.

Clearly, consumers interested in the category of Alsace wine will benefit from knowing a little bit about the house styles of at least the major producers. For example, estates such as Trimbach, Hugel and Léon Beyer have always produced resolutely dry wines throughout their range. Or, you can rely on a trusted wine merchant, or, better yet, use this article and my recent report on Alsace’s 2013s to find wines that are likely to make you happy.

Alsace’s high-quality viticulture and its outstanding wines have been documented for nearly a millennium. Wines from outstanding grand crus such as the Rangen and Sporen have been described and sought after since at least the 12th century. Clearly, among the region’s many strengths is its wealth of distinctive grape varieties and superior terroirs.

Alsace’s Grape Varieties and Wines

All of Alsace’s white wines share a certain opulence and richness of flavor, at times with relatively high alcohol levels, but they also offer a wide range of aroma and flavor profiles. Unlike wines from the rest of France, with just a few exceptions Alsace’s bottles are labeled with the name of the variety.

Clearly, it’s Alsace’s great Riesling and Gewürztraminer wines (both dry and sweet) that stake its claim to white wine immortality. The region’s Rieslings might not blessed with the almost magical floral daintiness of the best examples from the Mosel (or their low alcohol levels) but they offer greater power and texture, along with wonderful perfume, excellent delineation, convincing minerality and serious ageworthiness. Even better, dry Alsace Rieslings rarely come across as angular or bitter, unlike many of their Old World and New World counterparts.

Likewise, Gewürztraminer is rarely bitter, because an element of sweetness is routinely used to buffer the inherent amertume of the terpenes and other aromatic molecules that give Gewürztraminer wines their highly aromatic quality. With this variety, it’s important to avoid high yields, otherwise the wines tend to become too obvious and almost vulgar in their showiness. In Alsace, colder calcaire (limestone-rich) and clay soils of younger geological origin are ideally suited to the variety as they allow for potentially better acid retention in the wines, which is critical as Gewürztraminer is a low-acid variety. Alsace’s Gewürztraminers age much better than one might expect (I still own many 15-to-20+-year-old bottles that are beautifully vibrant and fresh): a combination of factors, including high alcohol and strong polyphenol structure, help to make up for the variety’s low acidity and ensure graceful evolution in bottle.