By Al Drinkle
Nobody lacks self-discipline like us at Metrovino. We make valiant attempts at restraint, but you’d never know it given the fact that we import 80+ disparate German Riesling labels each vintage. Despite its amorphous parameters, every year we encounter phenomenal wines in our travels that don’t fit neatly into our bloated “portfolio”. When a brief encounter with such a wine makes clear that a future without it would be impoverished, empty and meaningless, we import said wine for reasons of emotion — regardless of its lack of glass-pour potential at restaurants or inherent appeal to trophy hunters. (Yes, these wines often dwell in that strange financial purgatory that's beyond most restaurants’ BTG budgets, yet affordable enough to be regarded with suspicion by the many who assume that exceptional quality only correlates with lavish spending).
Consider this a plight to celebrate beauty in the world, and to encourage more of it. The last thing that we want to do, dear reader, is to dismiss a significant winegrowing achievement with apathy, in turn denying you a singular drinking experience. So without further ado, here’s our second offer in the “Leave No Beautiful Riesling Behind” series.
Introductory Offer:
$40 (20% discount, reg. $50)
Weingut Spreitzer - Scaling the Heights of the Rheingau
Despite the respect and adulation that they receive in Germany, Spreitzer's wines are criminally underappreciated in Canada. I've got a few conjectures as to why this might be, all of which involve brothers Andi and Bernd Spreitzer being refreshingly impervious to the wine world’s dubious fashions¹. On the other hand, they consistently produce excellent Riesling over a wide range of styles and at completely reasonable prices — and what could be more exciting and praiseworthy than that?!? Whenever we have a bottle of Spreitzer open at the shop, Richard will remind us that they're his favourite Riesling producer, and he'll then restate his bewilderment as to why their wines aren't more universally coveted.
Weingut Spreitzer is based in Oestrich-Winkel in the beating heart of the Rheingau region where the Rhein River is at its widest. Their 24 hectares of parcellated vineyards are all relatively close to their home, encompassing several historically-regarded sites in Oestrich, Winkel, Hattenheim, Mittelheim and Hallgarten.
The Rheingau is basically a 30-kilometre stretch of south-facing vineyards, the benign consequence of the Taunus Mountains (which Western Canadians would consider to be a series of unintimidating hills) temporarily diverting the Rhein River westwards from its otherwise northern trajectory. Vineyards spill down the mountains to the banks of the river, and being at the 50th parallel, the south-facing slopes and the temperature-moderating effects of the waterway (not to mention the stony soils) help to make the region a veritable paradise for Riesling.
That the total vineyard area of the Rheingau is dwarfed by Germany's other great sources for Riesling² is belied by the fact that it boasts such a disproportionate percentage of fundamentally great vineyards. It reminds one of Burgundy's Côte d’Or in terms of its utter concentration of hallowed sites, making it all the more frustrating that so few Rheingau producers are coming anywhere close to capitalising on the potential of the land that they're farming — and this has been a problem for decades. Much of the region was formerly owned by ecclesiastical estates or Prussian nobles, and has since passed into the hands of corporations or government-run behemoths, none of whom seem intent or capable of producing world-class wine with any consistency. Furthermore, a disheartening number of the smaller, independent growers lack the drive to exceed the lacklustre standards set by the monoliths.
Andi Spreitzer refers to this as a paucity of “hot blood”, and it's exacerbated by a changing climate. Perusing post-war literature on German wine, one will find unrelinquished praise heaped upon many of the Rheingau’s riverfront vineyards such as Erbacher Marcobrunn, Erbacher Siegelsberg or Winkeler Jesuitengarten. No small part of their prestige was based on the capacity to routinely ripen grapes in one of the world's most northerly wine regions, but increasingly hot summers and wildly unpredictable weather patterns are making the riverfront sites ever more challenging to farm — as Andi can attest in regards to Winkeler Jesuitengarten.
Germany's reputation for steep vineyards is sometimes subliminally equated with altitude, about which the country's wine regions have very little bragging rights. A number of sites in the Rheingau sit at less than 100 metres above sea level, but reaching 300 metres in places, the Hendelberg vineyard of the village of Hallgarten is amongst the Rheingau's most elevated winegrowing sites³. Indeed, this was once to its detriment. Frank Schoonmaker wrote in 1966, “the Hallgarteners of 1921, 1945 and 1949 were and still are famous. They are tremendous wines, fuller in body even than the Rüdesheimers, although drier and generally with less alcohol. But in poor or fair years [they] are another matter, and I cannot say that I find them attractive.”
Andi Spreitzer, Eva & Sarah sipping in Hendelberg
These days the “altitude” vineyards like Hendelberg are consistently reaching their apogee, and many of the producers who deserve our respect and attention in the Rheingau are doing some of their best work higher up in the hills. When tasting through the intimidating range of Rieslings at Spreitzer, I find that their Hendelberg is consistently amongst the most complex and satisfying of their dry wines. It’s admittedly not as imposing or solemn as the Grand Crus, but at a much lower price it's just as intricate and distinct while offering eminently greater utility… it's also more delicious and I can't think of an occasion in which I wouldn't be happy to drink it.
2023 Spreitzer Hendelberg Riesling Trocken
Spreitzer's 2023 Hendelberg is elegantly extroverted. You could be suffering from the worst cold in the world and you still wouldn't have to search for its aromas. Exotic in a strictly northern and verdant way, late-season orchard fruit hangs like Christmas ornaments from a juniper bush while glacial scree falls like snow. Apricots collide with aloe vera jelly as the homemade oatmeal finishes baking, and just as a piece of music could be said to be evocative of joy, the overall impression here is of the happiest Riesling aromas possible.
Great Rheingau Riesling is often described as being “aristocratic”, which like the aristocracy can involve a semblance of aloofness (if not outright disdain for its subjects), but this one is instead engaged and generous — a vinous benefactress, in fact. It's relatively full-bodied, to be sure, but manages caressing richness without even hinting at corpulence, in part thanks to a vibrant spine of electrifying acidity. None of its various facets are demure or furtive, and yet it parades its spectrum of flavours in single file. One sip reveals a pulsing, fervent minerality, the next a wheelbarrow full of heirloom apples. Then it’s a pine branch severed by a snowshoe followed by peach purée, chamomile and a Thai basil ice cube. Finally, the wine goes completely mercurial, sending all this and more into a hypnotic whirlpool on the palate. Did I mention that it’s dry? It is, and it's perfect this way — and all the more impressive that its boreally carnivalesque range of aromas and flavours are achieved without the aid of residual sugar.
It's often assumed that when wines taste great young they’ll inevitably lack the capacity to age, much like the beautiful popular kids in high school who became certified, lifelong losers in early adulthood. Certainly some of the world's great wines need bottle age to taste great, but the sprightful immediacy of Spreitzer’s Hallgarten shouldn’t deter one from tucking some bottles away for the future. Time in a loving cellar will encourage its spellbinding melange of flavours to melt in a waxier, more sublime direction, and my experience with these wines would suggest that a decade or two of enjoyment wouldn’t be an unreasonable expectation. In the meantime, decant it for an hour and serve it slightly warmer than fridge temperature in a glass with ample space for the hypnotic aromas to stretch out. In a perfect world where finances and cellar real estate allow, one would buy a case, drinking half of it over the next year or two and holding the rest until after the wine's tenth birthday.
Since perfectly balanced Riesling pairs with practically everything (or at least clashes with practically nothing), I'll spare you the ridiculous roll call of pairing recommendations that bolstered the word count of our previous entry in the “Leave No Beautiful Riesling Behind” series. But I will say that given how dynamic this wine is at the table, it's my absolute number one contender for a dinner where a cacophony of disparate recipes are all heaped upon the same plate at once — like at Christmas! Whether the centerpiece is turkey, goose, ham or Chinese food like in Bob Clark's A Christmas Story, a couple bottles of Hendelberg would make for a handsome addition to the spread.
¹ This is exemplified by their labels, which I used to criticise — sometimes directly to Andi, if prompted — although over the years I've come to associate them with the delicious wine on the inside of the bottle.
² The Rheinhessen and the Pfalz are 22 times and 19 times larger respectively, and the Rheingau is also less than half the size of the Mosel and 25% smaller than the Nahe.
³ Some sources claim that Hendelberg is the highest site in the Rheingau, and its most elevated sectors might be, but its vertically oblong shape means that some parts of the vineyard are at a much higher elevation than others.
Metrovino is Western Canada’s only source for Spreitzer’s 2023 Hendelberg Riesling.
There are 120 bottles available at the time of writing.
Introductory Offer:
$40 (20% discount, reg. $50)
