2010 Enkircher Ellergrub Riesling

Lemon, kumquat, and fresh ginger make for a pungent aromatic and zesty palate performance from the Immich 2010 Enkircher Ellergrub Riesling, at 11.5% alcohol more buoyant though no less palpably dense than its immediate siblings. It’s also higher in residual sugar, and while arguably dry-tasting, at least for now evinces a slight tug-of-war between its zesty and sharp citricity and its hint of sweetness. Given that it had been bottled for only two weeks when I tasted it, this might well have long ago knit itself together. The energy and refreshment conveyed in a sustained, wet stone-tinged finish give promise of a dozen or more year’s positive activity. When Gernot Kollmann (for more about whose acquisition of this venerable estate, see my report in Issue 192) wrote me to describe his vines and strategy both as caught in late September between early onset of botrytis – especially in his warmest and theoretically best parcels – and retarded ripeness, it seemed to me that there was no way he would be able to pull out success remotely like that he achieved in his inaugural 2009 vintage. But Kollmann has done what I deemed impossible. How? “Our strategy,” relates this experienced oenologist “was to pick out the botrytis fruit early with a select team and vinify it separately according to its unique needs as regards clarification and pressing. But then I added those musts back to the eventual harvest from each site, so that they would complete fermentation together. What we picked later in healthy condition” – this was in late October and the first days of November; whereby Kollmann notes that especially the stoniest portions of Ellergrub and Batterieberg almost entirely resisted botrytis until the end – “even permitted us some pre-fermentative skin contact to help reduce the acidity. We didn’t de-acidify at all,” he maintains. “I opted for strong, warm fermentations,” Kollmann continues, “to encourage an abundant yeast population; a high yield of glycerin to render the wines smoother; as well as better clarification and stronger reductivity to counteract the oxidative influences of botrytis” and the fermenting tanks were regulated only sufficiently to see that they came down to what he called “intuitively low levels of residual sugar,” legal Trockenheit being coincidental rather than critical to his intentions to produce the most expressive, well-balanced possible “dry” Rieslings. Importer: Mosel Wine Merchant Trier, Germany (various importers); tel. (413) 429-6176; +49 (0) 651 14551 38