Stefan Vetter - Sylvaner Muschelkalk
We drink Sylvaner Steinterassen Muschelkalk from 2016 by Stefan Vetter. Natural wine from Franconia.
Once again natural wine in our glasses. Sylvaner Steinterassen Muschelkalk from 2016 by Stefan Vetter. The Y stands for tradition. This means organic cultivation, manual work, spontaneous fermentation and no fining or filtration as well as little sulphur. And you can taste that. But whether you like it, that is another question.
The wine is relatively light in color, slightly cloudy. The first nose screams natural wine, apple skin without the fruit, dark, musty, it needs air. In the mouth there is quite a bit of resistance. Simple is different, but somehow there is a pretty cool zing at the back of the palate and then on the sides of the tongue. A lot of acidity paired with massive structure. A lot happening on the tongue, but if you’re looking for fruit, you won’t find it here. In the nose there is smoke, probably from the wooden barrel, and somehow I associate brown bananas in the background, but there is no sweetness either. Exciting.
And with it we have grilled gilthead. Half a lemon in the belly, olive oil brushed over the skin and then just let stand there on the griddle and wait 40 minutes. Bell peppers can lie beside it until the skin turned black all around. If you then peel the bell peppers and season the remaining inside with olive oil and salt, it all fits together perfectly. The structure in the wine complements the soft and juicy fish, the paprika adds some fruity sweetness, and the lightly burnt areas also go well with it. This is great food with really little effort. Just scratching the skin off the bell peppers is torture. It’s never fully easy, right?
The wine gets a bit woody in the nose as the evening progresses, fruit continues to stay away, the nose is complex, somehow hard to grasp, a bit of marzipan maybe, vanilla, core and seeds of apples, herbal oil, tea. And the fermented banana stays as well.
