2016 Riesling Deidesheimer Langenmorgen Grosses Gewächs

Steffen Christmann’s biodynamic commitments meant more or less constant vigilance and a more or less continuous round of treatment-spraying was needed to keep peronospora at bay during a vintage in which this sector of the Mittelhaardt had received by the end of June 2016 more precipitation than in the entire calendar year 2015. And like many growers, he faced occasional circumstances in which it was so sodden in the vineyards that the only means of spraying was on foot with canisters strapped to one’s back. But the results demonstrate that Christmann’s approach works even under unusually challenging, not to say adverse, conditions. Flowering was more than a week later than Christmann’s midterm average and nearly two weeks later than in either 2015 or 2014, leaving the vines to make up for a big loss of time. But after mid-July, of course, the weather turned dramatically – so much so that eventually there could be problems with drought stress, which thanks to years of conscientiously pampering his vineyard soils and tailoring their cover crops, Christmann avoided. And overall, his yields in 2016 weren’t even that far off normal.

Here is another address where a move in the direction of picking at lower must weights and putting a premium in vinification on conveying animation – trends discussed, with quotations from Steffen Christmann, in my coverage of his 2014s – has been aided and abetted by the nature of vintage 2016. Picking for the Burgundian varieties began on September 19 and not even one week later for Gutsriesling. In short, the aforementioned loss of time had for Christmann’s purposes been more than sufficiently made up. Picking for the village-level bottlings focused on the last days of September, with the first grapes for Idig Grosses Gewächs picked on the 30th of that month at 90 Oechsle, a decision at least as much on the basis of stylistic considerations as for insurance purposes. Harvest for site-specific bottlings proceeded apace during the first week of October, and on the 5th Christmann reported having debated back and forth with himself whether to return to the Idig or hold off. He elected to harvest, at 94 Oechsle and a level of acidity that had diminished in the preceding week but was by then, he reported, largely of the efficacious, stable tartaric sort. From October 7 to 12, fruit picked in the other top sites ranged as low as 88 Oechsle and never higher than 93. “Even though we’ve been telling you for years now that for us, must weights are of lesser importance [than taste],” wrote Christmann candidly in the closing entries of his harvest blog, “one still fails to entirely free oneself [from the old ‘Oechslomania’]. We could ultimately have waited – which a range of colleagues in fact did – and indeed achieved 95 or even 100 degrees Oechsle. Whether that [latter] approach will have succeeded – or whether [instead] those wines will be powerful but have sacrificed precision and elegance – we’ll have to wait and see.” But I think Christmann already had in mind the same answer to his question that I do, an answer that a decade ago would have represented a decidedly minority opinion, but no more. Incidentally, in 2016 the Christmanns harvested some Riesling for future Sekt, a genre absent from their lineup for many years, but which Steffen Christmann says he was inspired by Matthieu Kauffmann at von Buhl to bring back.

Characteristic of the finished 2016 collection here are relatively soft, gentle wines, a function of modest incoming acidity and some further diminution via malolactic conversion. But the clarity and buoyancy of the best admirably support Christmann’s stated stylistic goals and picking decisions. He elected to give this vintage’s Bienengarten Weissburgunder additional time in cask and was thus not ready to show it to me when I last visited to taste, so I’ll catch up with that wine when I taste the vintage 2017 Pinot Blancs, which, incidentally, include a fourth, experimental rendition courtesy of Steffen Christmann’s daughter Sophie. And speaking of extended élevage, I was encouraged during my recent visit by tasting two late-bottled vintage 2015 Rieslings on which I report below, one of which – nicknamed “Halbstück” – was absolutely terrific and did not even reach 11% alcohol. I have still, alas, never been given an opportunity to taste the auction wine here, “Ölberg-Hart Kapelle.” (For background on this estate, consult the introductions to my accounts of its 2014s and 2015s.)