Two Bottles Max Ferd. Richter
We drink from the winery Max Ferd. Richter a bottle of Graacher Himmelreich Kabinett 2021 and a bottle of Wehlener Sonnenuhr Kabinett Feinherb 2020.
It’s freezing cold outside. So cold, in fact, that the remains of a bird after eating at the grain buffet have frozen halfway to the ground and are now hanging on the balcony as bird shit icicles. Just the right weather to warm up to memories of summer, then. Warm it was, in fact, when we were at Mythos Mosel in June. And so we will spend the next four weeks drinking ourselves with wines from the Mosel from this year into next year and also over Christmas. We’ll start with two Rieslings from the Max Ferdinand Richter winery in Mülheim an der Mosel. The winery was founded as early as 1680, so it will soon have 350 years of tradition under its belt. Today, Dirk and Constantin Richter, father and son, are responsible for the wines from about 20 hectares of vineyards. And these vineyards are basically a cross-section of everything that has rank and name in the Mosel Valley and over 90% planted with Riesling. Today’s choice is a bottle of Wehlener Sonnenuhr Kabinett Feinherb from 2020 and a bottle of Graacher Himmelreich Kabinett 2021.
We start with the Wehlener Sonnenuhr. It has very clear, cool fruit, stone and a good portion of stone fruit. There is really a lot of green, crisp apple and also a bit of mirabelle and some citrus on the nose. And the wine is extremely clean, cool and straightforward on the tongue as well. It’s super juicy and fresh at first, but then gets a light texture at the back of the tongue that clings there, is stony and citrusy and calls for the next sip. The 20-ish grams of residual sugar are actually completely outweighed by the acidity, so the wine seems more dry than residual sweet. I like that.
Since we were on the road, the wines were allowed or had to wait a day longer in the refrigerator for us this time. So what is for us the second evening with the wines, is for the wine already the third evening after opening. As expected, however, this does not matter at all. In the Wehlener Sonnenuhr is now more grapefruit instead of apple in the nose and further the mirabelle. And the freshness that the wine has continues to be really strong, but, I’m getting ahead of myself a bit, it doesn’t come close to what the 2021 delivers. Still, this is a wonderful wine.
The Kabi from the Graacher Himmelreich first smells mighty strange directly after opening. But it’s still very young, so that can happen. But then it fades very quickly and what follows is so good that I immediately reorder. The wine is a bit darker in the nose, where dark is wrong, this goes more in the direction of orange, the fruit and not the wine style. In addition, there is also stone and also some herbs. The acidity, however, is brutal. And also brutally beautiful. It’s so fruity that you think you’ve just squeezed limes and lemons directly onto your tongue. We should try using this as a citrus juice substitute in a cocktail. It’s really great. And although the wine is still a bit sweeter with 50 grams of residual sugar, you don’t notice much of it. I already had respect for 2021 at the Mosel and somehow certainly rightly so, but if this is as ripe and fruity as here. Wow is this beautiful.
The wine gets more subtle on the nose over the two nights. There is a bit of multivitamin juice and further the orange and now actually seemingly dark minerality. That’s already great how it smells but somehow also a bit indifferent because right now I’m drinking this because of what’s happening on the tongue. There is a bit of lactic in the meantime, but there is also further the lemon and lime party directly on the middle of the tongue. While you’re drinking, the heartburn waves at you from the side, smiling softly, but with one bottle and two drinkers, it might just be okay. I also don’t even want to know how acidic that is analytically when I notice the sugar so little. And fluoride toothpaste is certainly a good idea afterwards too. But boy is that wine amazing right now.