2008 Selbach-Oster Zeltinger Sonnenuhr Riesling Auslese**

The Selbach-Oster 2008 Zeltinger Sonnenuhr Riesling Auslese one star – from a parcel adjacent to the Rotlay – displays ripe peach, musk melon, and vanilla that are contrasted on the palate with peach pit bitterness and wet stone. Subtle creaminess of texture and hints of white raisin point toward the wine’s ennoblement, but it is really its extra measure of weight that augured for its being bottled as Auslese. This lacks the focus, layering, or lift of the most striking wines in the present collection, but its imposing plushness and sheer length are certainly impressive. I would expect this to merit at least two decades of cellaring. Johannes Selbach responded to the high energy and acidity of the 2008 vintage by giving most of the wines extra fine-lees contact and later-than-usual bottling. As a champion of (in his words) “genuine Kabinett” and “drinking wine, not trophy wine” and a resister against the encroachment of high must weights and residual sugar to which the weather in most recent vintages has left even him susceptible, Selbach was predictably overjoyed both with the refreshment, delicacy, and infectious drinkability made possible by vintage 2008, and with its preponderance of Kabinett and Spatlese. Several single-parcel, block-picked (i.e. the whole crop at once), vineyard-designated wines were essayed (that from the Anrecht – within Zeltinger Himmelreich – being new this year) although at Spatlese rather than, as usually in the past, Auslese Pradikat level. In fact, it remains Selbach’s intention to very soon remove the already small-print reference to Pradikat from these special bottlings, whose focus is intended to be entirely on reflecting terroir and vintage. (Ironically, though, the reference to the sites themselves remain in very small print, because the authorities are testy about the use of geographical designations other than those of the official Einzellagen singled-out – or, to put it more appropriately, assembled – in 1971.) There are a few regional importers of certain Selbach wines, but the majority (and those whose prices are noted above) are Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel. (516) 677-9300