2016 Riesling Sommerberg

The only estate that I visit regularly that is housed in a beautiful villa right in the periphery of the city of Colmar, Domaine Schoffit was founded in 1973 by Robert Schoffit, who started out with 10 hectares (though his grandson Alexander told me the family’s ancestors were involved in winemaking as far back as 1599). Robert’s son Bernard Schoffit increased holdings and made the estate’s name by producing a series of rich, concentrated wines that were once very sweet and exceptionally concentrated even at the supposedly “dry” level, but are now more classically dry. Most importantly, Bernard pushed to buy land in what is perhaps Alsace’s most famous grand cru, the Rangen near the town of Thann, the slopes of which had been abandoned because of their exceptionally steep pitch. The estate now owns 6.5 hectares in the Rangen (they bought these from Charles Hippler, then President du Syndicat Viticole de Thann) and makes some of the best Pinot Gris wines in Alsace from the site, though Schoffit now also owns vineyards in the Sommerberg grand cru. And so the estate today owns 17 hectares and produces about 80,000 bottles a year; Bernard’s son Alexander (after whom one of the estate wines is named) is increasingly taking over running the estate.