2019 Riesling Bopparder Hamm Feuerlay Spätlese

I last tasted the wines of this highly regarded, Spay-based VDP member in 2016, so a return visit was overdue. The Müller’s sons Johannes (a graduate of Geisenheim) and Christoph are involved full time. The latter showed me the wines on this occasion and reported that he and his brother intend to play around with cask maturation and longer lees contact where until now stainless steel and early bottling have been the norms. At 4–5 grams of residual sugar, the vintage 2020 Grosse Gewächse are a bit drier than those of previous years, for which Christoph credits his and his brother’s influence. There are lots of nicknames (officially “fantasy names”) on labels in lieu of full vineyard names, but not the “S” designation that used to be appended to selected favored bottlings, and in keeping with current VDP trends and strictures, Prädikats have been dropped from all but the very overtly sweet wines. I was able to taste most of the estate’s vintage 2020 collection – which reflected considerable success given a punishingly hot dry summer – but only a few wines (exclusively sweet ones) from prior years. “The must weights were even higher in 2019 than in 2020,” reported Christoph Müller, “but acidity was also higher. The 2020 harvest was easy – unless you were looking for botrytis – whereas 2019 was more difficult due to the need for selection.” There is a considerable collection of generic Müller bottlings, both dry and not, but I did not taste any of those on this occasion. (For some details on this estate, consult the introduction to my report on its vintage 2015 collection.)