2003 Gruner Veltliner Smaragd Kellerberg

Pichler Senior insists he did not have to take any special precautions at harvest this year. "The grapes looked beautiful; they had thick skins and were completely healthy," he says, implying 'what more could you want?' But he did have to wait. Save for a couple of Federspiels picked three weeks in advance, the main harvest only began the last week in October and stretched into December. "With frost and three-quarters of your harvest still hanging in the snow, you had to keep your nerve," commented F. X. , explaining that he learned the hard lesson in 1983 not to panic on account of heat and high sugar when the flavors weren't really ripe. Many of Pichler's wines had been bottled only a week before I tasted but I did not notice any indications of sickness. Readers will note that an "M" or "Unendlich" bottling are absent from this year's riesling collection. Pichler opined that something even more powerfully concentrated than the Steinertal or longer and more complex than the Loibenberg and Kellerberg bottlings was not in the cards this year. That is not, I think, an acknowledgement of any limitation of the vintage, but rather a testimony to the stunning quality of those site-specific bottlings with which this year's collection culminates. (Weygandt-Metzler, Unionville, PA) Also recommended: 2003 Riesling Smaragd Von den Terrassen.