2018 Riesling Spätlese trocken Alte Reben

General manager Julia Lübcke and estate-veteran Sascha Dannhäuser continued with vintage 2018 their efforts to restore and buttress the Karthäuserhof’s reputation while presiding over a surface area that (as detailed in my previous report) has expanded considerably beyond the estate’s core “Karthäuserhofberg” hillsides. The drought here in summer, 2018 was worse even than that of 2003, avers Dannhäuser, because in that notorious earlier year, the Ruwer, unlike most of viticultural Germany, got a bit of summer rain that it lacked in 2018. “The two days of rain we finally got on around the 12th of September staved-off major shut-down and without them the 2018 vintage would have turned out very differently,” he contends. Picking began on September 24, notably late for 2018, which doubtless reflects a certain degree of summer shut-down that slightly retarded ripening. “But then we picked very steadily,” notes Lübcke, “because that was the thing in 2018, not to lose freshness or let the must weights get too high. And in the first days, even on the Karthäuserhofberg itself, we were still able to pick Kabinett in the mid-80s [of Oechsle].” “Even at those levels, though, the flavors were ripe and the pips separated easily from the core of the grapes,” observes Dannhäuser, adding though that must weights rose precipitously from there, which suggests something of a contrast with what most growers in the Greater Mosel experienced.

Selective picking resulted in a series of Auslesen, albeit one not approaching the multiplicity of that at nearby Grünhaus. On the last recent occasions when such a series was generated at this estate, namely in 2011 and 2009, none of the wines remotely approached the quality of 2018’s best. There is also a B.A. and a trio of T.B.A.s! The estate wasn’t ready to show me two of the T.B.A.s, but the one I tasted represents a high-point for that genre at this estate that in my extensive experience has been reached on only one other occasion (namely in 2005) during the past half century. Many of the Karthäuserhof 2018s got bottled already in March, the rest only a bit later, except, in the case of the Grosses Gewächs, not until summer.

Early in 2020 it was announced that the team of Richard Grosche and Matthieu Kauffmann – formerly of Weingut Reichsgraf von Buhl, which they were compelled to leave in mid-2019 – had been hired as joint directors of the Karthäuserhof. Sascha Dannhäuser remains in his winemaking capacity; former general manager Julia Lübcke has departed. (Details about this estate including its somewhat complicated recent history as well as an explanation of its slightly baffling labeling practices can be found in the introductions to my coverage of its wines from vintages 2014-2017. On the aforementioned recent expansions, consult the introduction to my report on the 2017s.)