Germany

No other wine country repays attention to detail the way Germany does. Plenty of us are familiar with the specificity of German wine labels, but few realize the focus, heritage, and love behind them. German wine is in the midst of a stunning transformation. It is moving from safe toward thrilling — and at blinding speed. Riesling reigns supreme, but there’s been a significant shift in the direction of Spätburgunder and Chardonnay that is very much worth tracking. 

bike basket advertising German-speaking wines from four regions
  • · ·

    The Insider’s Guide to Württemberg Riesling

    ByValerie Kathawala

    What do you do when you have world-class Riesling terroirs — including some of Germany’s highest, coolest vineyards, extraordinary old vines and massale selections, and a growing cadre of hyper-talented producers who bring imagination and dedication to it all —  but the world still thinks of you as a place for, well, something else?  This is the predicament of Württemberg’s growers. Over the past decade, they’ve made a strong argument that Riesling should be front and center when we consider the wines of this southwestern German region. Although not everyone believes a narrowed focus benefits Württemberg’s identity (the region’s top…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • ·

    Varietal Psychology

    ByRainer Schäfer

    There’s no end to writings about how wine affects people. It begets relaxation and well-being, of course, but also stimulating discussion. The right bottle can be just the spark needed to light up a dull evening. But can certain wines channel our moods and perceptions — our very psychology — in different ways?  This question was often posed by Wolf-Dietrich Salwey, a vintner who passed away in a car accident in 2011. Known for his unconventional character, Salwey routinely invited neighbors, colleagues, and friends to his estate in Oberrotweil in the Kaiserstuhl to explore the influence of specific grape varieties…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • · ·

    3 Can’t-Miss Sparkling Wines (with Umlauts)

    ByDaniela Dejnega

    ​The world of sparkling wines is changing for the better. The number of producers approaching this beverage in serious, artisanal, and creative ways continues to climb. “Grower Sekt” from Austria and Germany is very much en vogue. We are witnessing a tremendous push to quality. For a long time, “mass over class” was the motto, especially in Germany. But for a new generation, awareness of terroir and a trend toward reducing residual sugar are increasingly the focus. No stone has been left unturned in Austria, either. For several years, Austrian Sekt has been governed by a three-tiered quality pyramid: “Sekt…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • · ·

    Franken — Germany’s Most Underrated Region

    ByValerie Kathawala

    We’ll come right out and say it: Franken (Franconia) is Germany’s most underrated region. If you still think of it as the source of wan wines poured from squat flagons and drunk mostly at home, we’re here to let you in on a secret: there has never been a more exciting time for this corner of northern Bavaria, where wine, not beer, rules the day.  The region sits just below the 50th parallel and at the cool, eastern edge of Germany’s wine core. It’s a perilous position for viticulture. As decades of frost-crimped and extreme-heat-affected vintages attest, its starkly continental…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here

  • Evolving the German Wine Queen Tradition

    ByCathy Huyghe

    The story starts with a pedicure and a camping van. Each year when the German wine queen visits New York City, Paul Grieco treats her to a pedicure. (If the queen’s mother is also visiting, she gets one, too.) Grieco is a sommelier, vocal Riesling advocate, and owner/manager of Terroir wine bar in New York. He is also part jester, reveling in the micro-tradition of the pedicure while also pointing toward the intellectual esteem in which he holds every queen he’s ever met.  Grieco honors the queens, he said, “because we [at Terroir] are fans of history and culture and [the queens] are an…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • · ·

    German Wines Shine at Restaurant Scheepskameel

    ByBart De Vries

    “When I started drinking wine, wine was French,” my father told me recently over dinner at Scheepskameel, a Dutch restaurant known for its excellent wine menu. He never spends more than 10 euro on a bottle, and rarely drinks white, but that evening he unexpectedly admitted, he preferred our glass of German Riesling to our bottle of red Bordeaux. A few days later, I hosted a Riesling tasting for some serious wine friends. They have accounts with posh traders and their own cellars, which are typically stocked with Burgundies and Bordeaux. They were impressed. But, I wondered, would they buy…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • · · ·

    Returning Historic Varieties to Germany’s Vineyards

    ByMatthias Neske

    This is a story for the wine romantics among us who dream of bygone varieties, who hunker down to listen to the old stone terraces telling stories of yesteryear, of those with a weak spot for growers and wines committed to character. It is in this world of nostalgia and nerds that this story is set. Enter Ulrich “Uli” Martin, a viticulturist from Gundheim in Rheinhessen. “Such a reliable companion!” he says. “Honest, direct, and amiable. You sense it immediately.” This high praise, however, is not aimed at his best friend, at least not in the traditional sense. Rather, at a grape…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • · ·

    Book Review: “Mosel Wine”

    ByValerie Kathawala

    We like to think of Mosel wine as eternally glorious. The river valley’s nearly 2,000-year vinous history, its relics of Roman civilization and tributes to Celtic wine gods, its very viticulture carved with seeming permanence into stony banks all suggest an unbroken line. But an excellent new book, edited by Lars Carlberg, with able assistance from David Schildknecht, Kevin Goldberg, and Per Linder, underscores the extent to which the Mosel’s glory has been far more ebb than flow. Such awareness only makes the late 19th-century golden age that is the book’s focus more luminous.  The book nests together several components…....

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • ·

    Can Spätlese Be Saved?

    ByTerry Theise

    Not long ago, in my merchant days, I scored a few cases of mature Mosel wines from a grower I didn’t know. It wasn’t much wine, the prices were attractive, and I was able to eke out a few bottles for my cellar, which can never have too many ready-to-drink Rieslings. They were 1982s and 1985s. I had a wine friend over and opened one of the bottles to begin the evening’s festivities. “Oh I do like old Riesling,” my friend said, “And isn’t it amazing how well even a Kabinett can age?” “It is indeed,” I said. “But this isn’t a…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here

  • Crémant is Germany’s Best Kept Secret

    ByNicole Wolbers

    German Crémant is one of sparkling wine’s best-kept secrets. The high-quality classification requires strict hand harvesting and whole-bunch pressing to ensure that only the purest juice is used. Since its legalization over a decade ago, it has built a sparkling identity for itself, separate from its more established cousin Sekt.  As one of the world’s best-selling sparkling style, crémant has at some point most likely graced your glass. Wine aficionados appreciate it for its delicate mousse, high quality, and ultimate value. Yet even among those who know and love crémant, few are aware that, far from being the sole property…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • ·

    Delicious Whites under Northern Lights

    ByPaula Redes Sidore

    Liora Levi, high-profile sommelier, television personality, and president of ASI Norwegian Sommelier Association, came late to wine. In its own odd way, that only bolsters her bona fides as a daughter of the north. The countries to the north of the umlaut region can generally be viewed as latecomers to the joys of wine, and white wine in particular. But times change, and opinion makers like Levi have now helped the Nordics become prime drivers of the Riesling Revolution. It is a boom time for whites under the northern lights. As Levi explains in an interview with TRINK, the delayed…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • ·

    Mason Washington and the Pull of German Roots

    ByValerie Kathawala

    Mason Washington wants to set himself apart in the wine world. He’s convinced his German identity is the ticket.   The 24-year-old digital media marketer grew up in Fayetteville, North Carolina, a small city in the American south that Washington charitably describes as being “what you make of it.” It was an unlikely place for a young Black man to be raised in a German family. But his grandmother Ingrid, a native of Berlin, and his mother, Carmen, born in Munich, were just that. “The biggest thing for me is the German heritage on my mom’s side,” says Washington. Now, he’s digging into…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • · ·

    Nahe – Welcome to Germany’s Wild West

    ByPaula Redes Sidore

    Some say it lacks the historical cache of the Rheingau, the legendary vineyard names of the Mosel, or the easy charm of neighboring Rheinhessen. There are no convenient river boats to ferry you between wine villages, nor even particularly good train connections. No argument: the Nahe [NAHH-heh] Valley demands that you put in a bit of work to explore its more far-flung corners.  The reward for those efforts is some of the most objectively fascinating landscapes, geology, climate, and wines anywhere in Germany. In fact, things can get downright adventurous in Germany’s version of the (Wine) Wild West. From the…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here

  • Releasing the Power of Hidden Sweetness

    ByDavid Schildknecht

    “Dry” describes what wine drinkers overwhelmingly profess to desire. And “trocken” can only appear on labels of German Rieslings with less than 10 grams of residual sugar.  If one desires sweetness, there is no lack: Most of today’s Kabinetts are higher in sugar than were Auslesen of the 1980s. (Granted, the grapes were probably also higher in must weight.) Aesthetically as well as commercially, success in the realm of legal dryness—Trockenheit—as well as that of pronounced sweetness, can scarcely be denied. German Riesling growers have long since succeeded in proving that they too can render world-class dry wine, while simultaneously…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • ·

    The New Teachings of Old Field Blends

    ByNils Kevin Puls

    The year is 1806. The date June 17th. Privy Councilor Goethe sits in Frankfurt — high and dry. He reaches for his quill and writes a letter to a friend: “Send me some Würzburger wine, for no other wine satisfies, and I am morose without my accustomed favorite drink.”  While the line may not be poetic, the composition Johann Wolfgang von Goethe thirsted for is. The wine in question was, quite possibly, “Frentsch” (local dialect for Altfränkischer Satz or Old Franconian Mixed Set): a field blend of some 20 grape varieties, all planted, harvested, and fermented together. What once gave growers a bit of…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here
  • · ·

    What to Drink When a Somm Comes to Dinner

    ByChris Losh

    It is Friday night and I’m terrified. In 24 hours, a top sommelier is coming to our house for dinner. A sommelier who puts together the wine lists for a global restaurant group; a sommelier who has spent over 30 years training more somms than I’ve seen typos on a wine list; a sommelier who matches food and wine the way the rest of us match our Sunday outfits. And tomorrow, I’m responsible for the wine. My wife draws up a shopping list for the meal, blissfully unconcerned. “We’re not a restaurant,” she says, “why should she expect Michelin-starred cooking?”…...

    Membership Required

    You must be a member to access this content.

    View Membership Levels

    Already a member? Log in here