Rheingau and Mittelrhein Riesling: Rising to 2017’s Challenges

BY DAVID SCHILDKNECHT | AUGUST 08, 2019

Like the nearby Nahe and many parts of the Mosel, the Rheingau and Mittelrhein were seriously impacted by late April 2017 frost that killed off buds unusually advanced thanks to an atypically warm late winter and early spring. A hot, dry high summer put young vines or those in especially drought-prone sites under stress. But in most vineyards, heat also turbocharged what was already a precocious growing season. An August 1 hailstorm decimated vineyards around Hattenheim, Hallgarten and Oestrich, with somewhat less damaging hail striking other Rheingau sectors later that month, accompanied by wind damage. And so, well before harvest approached, vintage 2017 had already proven difficult for local growers and destined to be low-yielding. But difficult did not mean unpromising.

Andreas Spreitzer, carrying on the tradition of his great-grandfather (left), an ex-restaurateur who founded Weingut Spreitzer in 1899, has once again, with brother Bernd, fielded an outstanding collection.

Mixed Blessings

“If things stay hot and dry, we might be starting the harvest with Trockenbeerenauslese, like we did in 2003,” opined Andreas Spreitzer when I tasted with him in early August 2017, “while if we get inopportune rain it could be like 2006 or even 2000,” which are the closest since 1984 that Riesling Germany has come to a disastrous vintage (though for diametrically opposed reasons). In the event, neither extreme was quite realized. But 2017 ended up featuring the earliest harvest in most estates’ history. (For some, 2003 or 2011 retained that distinction, but 2018 would beat them all everywhere.) And late summer did indeed bring rain, which was beneficial in reviving parched vines but challenging in other respects, and far in excess of what was needed to break the midsummer drought.

Mid-September saw must weights for which growers forty years ago would have given thanks had they been achieved by late October, but this was far from an unalloyed blessing. Not only would longer hang time probably have benefited flavor development, but acid levels were stubbornly high, for reasons that are still under dispute. Is this traceable to vines having malingered during the drought period, or more to the late-summer chill that descended on most German Riesling regions, especially at night, locking in acidity rather than permitting it to drop? The chill was arguably welcome insofar as it slowed the accumulation of sugar, promoted aroma-building and retarded botrytis. Even so, rot pressure began building, and in many vineyards, ignoble botrytis broke out. Most growers decided to disregard high acidity and begin harvesting, in order to avoid both additional crop losses to rot and excess volatility or alcohol from grapes whose health might be compromised or whose must weights could overshoot the limit for balanced dry wine. (Must deacidification would end up being widely practiced, though I am reasonably confident that it was not used on any of those wines I judge to be vintage standouts.)

Echoing a common refrain, Johannes Eser observed that “you had to work very precisely but quickly” – an injunction that could only be fulfilled by estates with a skilled, flexible, indefatigable and numerically sufficient harvest team. Naturally, though, the degree to which fruit succumbed to rot or overripeness varied considerably according to location and to an estate’s viticultural regimen throughout the growing season. While he is a newcomer to the region, one can hardly take exception to Urban Kaufmann’s observation that “whoever worked diligently in [his or her] vineyards, then harvested clean and selectively, was rewarded with delicious wines. But whoever didn’t... well, let’s just say that this is a vintage with large variations [Schwankungen] in quality.” All of this having been taken into account, things might have been worse. My survey of vintage 2017 Rieslings reveals that precipitous rot and overripeness were less problematic among top Rheingau growers – despite their farming in part gentle and relatively water-retentive slopes – than among those in many of the Middle Mosel’s steep-sloped and theoretically fast-draining sectors, where some of the late summer’s highest precipitation was recorded.

Johannes Leitz's hundred liters from these shriveled berries, picked in late September 2017 in the Rüdesheimer Berg Roseneck, ran from the press (very reluctantly) almost as clear and green-gold as a Kabinett. The resulting TBA represents a high point of this German Riesling vintage.

Median = Memorable?