2012 Grande Cuvée Nouvelle Vague TBA (Nummer 6)

Gerhard Kracher was in Thailand when I visited the winery in early February, so I had the opportunity to taste a range of the estate's new releases with his mother Michaela, the late Alois Kracher’s wife. She has largely withdrawn from an active role at the estate, leaving her son the freedom to pursue his own goals. We tasted the wines in the new Vinothek that they opened in 2013 for cellar-door sales. Currently, they are building a new cellar across the street.

As over three-quarters of their business is with sweet wines, the last few vintages have been heartbreakers. “We haven’t had a great year for Trockenbeerenauslese since 2008,” she told me. “In particular, 2013 and 2014 were very difficult. We made no Eiswein at all and had very little volume of the others.” Fortunately for their finances, they now have a large import program too, with names like Gaja, Billecart-Salmon and Sine Qua Non in their portfolio, and dabble as well in blue cheese, chocolate and vinegar.

I then tasted the Trockenbeerenausleses a month later in my office along the Rhine. Most were from 2012, which was a hot, dry year. Rain, and thus botrytis, came only very late. As always, all of the Trockenbeerenausleses are numbered, with the lowest numbers being the ones Kracher thinks are the best.