Two Bottles Bernhard
We are drinking a bottle of Chardonnay Limited Edition from 2022 and a Wolfsheimer Silvaner from limestone marl from 2021, both from Weingut Bernhard in Rheinhessen.
They say the early bird catches the worm, but it doesn’t have to be particularly early for that at the Maxime Open. And probably even later birds didn’t have to leave the station in Schwabsburg with empty glasses, but it certainly wasn’t as deserted as it was shortly after 11 a.m. To address this right away, I had no idea where Wolfsheim was located and accordingly, I had no idea that wine was made there. And honestly, Wolfsheimer Sankt Kathrin, Götzenborn, and Osterberg are not wine locations that make me tremble internally. A look at the vineyard map is actually very helpful for geographical orientation. Martina Bernhard, who stood behind the counter in Schwabsburg, runs the Weingut Bernhard there in Wolfsheim together with her father Jörg. The first thing we say on our side of the table, even before we have a wine in our glass, is how beautiful the labels with the cloudy splashes of color are. And they still are. The next thing we say is how much we like the wines. Perfect for the review now. The Chardonnay 2022 shouldn’t actually exist at all, as these batches normally disappear into a cuvée. That didn’t quite fit, but the wine developed far too well in its year on the full lees. So this limited edition was created. We’re also drinking a Silvaner village wine from the Wolfsheim sites. The village wines are spontaneously fermented, all vineyards are biodynamically managed. The Silvaner then rests on the lees in large oak barrels for 7 months before being bottled.
But we start with the Chardonnay. It smells fresh of rather yellow pome fruit. And just as fresh as the wine smells, it also drinks. In addition, it has a really nice structure. Sure, you won’t find great depth, but who’s looking for that in a wine for well under 10 euros. Exactly. Actually, this is a total bargain and I can’t understand why the wine is bottled in a limited edition and doesn’t simply end up in the bottle every year. I really like it. In the courtyard in Schwabsburg and at the dining table at home. The empty glass then smells a bit like sugared popcorn and you really have to be careful to even get a second day with the bottle.
And exactly this second evening is then almost like the first. There’s energy and pull in the glass and the mixture of acidity, freshness, structure and minimal creaminess on the finish is simply good.
Actually, the Silvaner was intended for personal pleasure and I wanted to try Pinot Noir with the Chardonnay. But the cork had other plans and it was the corkiest cork I’ve ever smelled. It happens. But at least on the educational side, I could learn something again. In the past, the corked wine always smelled much more intensely of cork taint than the cork itself. Here it was exactly the opposite. I even thought for a few minutes that it wasn’t so bad and maybe you could drink around it. You couldn’t. It took about half an hour, then the wine was completely wet cellar cardboard. Tree bark does tree bark things and so the Silvaner gets its place in the spotlight.
In terms of fruit, it’s much, much riper than the Chardonnay. There’s hay, something herbal and just the relatively ripe-seeming, but somehow not really attributable fruit. This doesn’t sound very inviting, but I can’t get my nose out of the glass. It’s somehow quite fascinating. When drinking, the wine is crystal clear and structured. There’s orange, some grapefruit bitterness and with the taste in the mouth, the exotic note also makes the retronasal jump into the nose. And the wine becomes even more exciting with air, deeper, more complex and sufficiently compensates for the missing bottle of Pinot Noir. We’ve already eaten, but I can imagine that the wine could also be a great food companion for a snack.
The fruit becomes clearer overnight and a shade more yellow. There’s mango, some wood spice and still the hay. Next to the really crisp Chardonnay, the Silvaner has a bit of a hard time maintaining the tension. So drink them one after the other and give your tongue time to adjust to the lesser acidity. There’s the white of citrus fruits, there’s orange and a bit of yuzu, but without the acidity kick. This is really very nice and I’m glad to have stumbled upon the winery in Rheinhessen.