There's much more to German wines than Riesling
Most people associate German wine with Riesling. Germany is certainly Riesling’s principal residence, but at 23 per cent of the grapes planted, there are plenty of other things besides. Germany’s warmer southern wine regions, like Baden and Württemberg, don’t always possess the right slate soils to make good Riesling, and the white wines that prosper are often made from Pinots Blanc (Weißburgunder) and Gris (Grauburgunder). The latter with its pink bunches is the Grey Monk, brought to Germany by Cistercian monks from Cîteaux in Burgundy in the Middle Ages. The monks are supposed to have introduced the black grape Pinot Noir too, and after France and the United States, there is more Pinot Noir (Spätburgunder) in Germany than anywhere else on earth. For obvious reasons, white, grey and black Pinots are known collectively as Burgunder varieties in Germany.
Even if it is rarely as sumptuous as the greatest reds from the Côte de Nuits in Burgundy, German Pinot Noir can be exquisite. The best are produced in the northerly Ahr region, near the Cold War capital Bonn, where they can be enchantingly delicate and floral. They are also a stock-in-trade in and around the Kaiserstuhl, a defunct volcano on Baden. It is Germany’s hottest spot and here they tend to be a lot beefier. Pinot Noir, however, is not confined to any one region any more: it is successfully planted in the Mosel, the Rheingau, Rheinhessen, the Nahe and the Pfalz and with climate change, the results are increasingly good.
The problem with top German Spätburgunder or Pinot Noir is that it can be expensive – sometimes almost as expensive as the best Burgundy. Not everyone can run to star Baden growers like the Hegers, Hubers, Kellers, Salweys or indeed a personal favourite, Fritz Wassmer; or Fürst in Franconia, Knipser or Kuhn in the Pfalz; August Kesseler in the Rheingau; or Adeneuer, Kreuzberg, Mayer-Näkel, Nelles or Stodden in the Ahr.
So I asked German-expert David Motion, proprietor of the excellent The Winery in London’s Little Venice (a second shop is opening soon in Parson’s Green) to come up with some suggestions for good-value Burgunders, and this was the result. With one exception they all come in at under £20 a bottle.
The Weißburgunders started with the 2019 from Borrell-Diehl in the southern Palatinate or Pfalz (£12.99). This was a bargain for a handmade wine of this quality. It led with a whiff of talcum powder, apples and pears, and possessed a good weight and super-long finish.
The next up was a simple, fresh, clean 2018 summer wine from Walter in Briedel on the Mosel (£14.99) – the stronghold of German Riesling. From Gau-Odernheim in the middle of Rheinhessen there was a cool, juicy 2019 from Becker-Landgraf (£18.99). My favourite wine of the flight was the 2019 old vine (Alte Reben) Hainfelder Letten Grauburgunder from Borrell-Diehl (£16.99) with its delightful aroma of rosewater and its pronounced spicy taste.
So to the reds: the 2018 Borrell-Diehl Spätburgunder was a pleasant, light wine at £13.99. There was a caramel/toffee smell on the nose and a little flavour of strawberries on the palate. The Bischel Winery in Appenheim near Bingen in Rheinhessen is a new member of the elite VDP group which numbers most of Germany’s top estates among its members. The 2017 Spätburgunder (£18.99) had plenty of raspberry and cherry fruit and a good structure. Sinß is in Windesheim in the Nahe, close to Bischel, but on the other side of the River Nahe. The Spätburgunder ‘S’ (£22.99) was concentrated, with plenty of ebullient fruit and a hint of chocolate; but my personal favourite was a 2018 from Becker-Landgraf in Rheinhessen (£18.99). It was by no means a thunderer, but a light, cooling Pinot Noir with an authenticity of flavour that you would recognise anywhere as Pinot Noir.
One wine in the line-up did not come from David’s shop: Bibo Runge Provokateur Sekt (or traditional sparkling wine). It hails from Oestrich-Winkel in the Rheingau and combines a three-year old Riesling with a bit of red wine to make it pink. The result is a salmon-coloured wine tasting of mature Riesling with a bouquet of rose petals, dried herbs and orange peel. Oestrich-Winkel is close to the beautiful former Cisterician monastery of Kloster Eberbach. It is ironic perhaps, that the wines of the Rheingau should be so dominated by Riesling nowadays, and not by the Burgunders that were once the monks’ special blessing.
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