Volume 05 – Then & Now

May 2021

Man holding a mug of red wine next to his arm with a tattoo of clinking glasses

Dear Readers,

Over the last year, time has taken on a disconcertingly elastic quality. Now with doors and windows wide open, it’s time to review and reassess what has already come and what still lies ahead. This perspective fueled the volume you now hold in your hands. We found ourselves looking at patterns in the wine world, tides that are reshaping the floor beneath us, even as they carried some things on to shore and sent others out to sea.

In Vol. 05 you’ll find music scholar Ronald Merlino reassessing Beethoven’s life and works in the context of Viennese wine culture. Joyce Lin questions the definition of comfort food and in doing so, finds a wine pairing that gives fresh meaning to an iconic Taiwanese dish. And legendary importer and author Terry Theise reflects on insights gained from a life devoted to German and Austrian wine.

We then shift to an examination of how the past is shaping the future. This kicks off with Steven Sidore’s sharp review of the winners and losers of the freshly inked German Wine Act. Our Swabian-based reporter Katharina Matheis taps into the small-grower renaissance in organic and biodynamic farming in Württemberg. Writing from Berlin, Eva Biringer explores the German capital’s new embrace of alcohol-free life. And Paula Redes Sidore rides the currents of Swiss wine trends with ambassadors Stephen Reinhardt, Marc Almert, and Yvonne Heistermann.

Beyond that, from Vienna, Daniela Dejnega shares three insider picks from Carnuntum that should be on everyone’s lips. From Switzerland, Daniel and Liliana Schönberger take us into the hidden world of Swiss wine and cider grower Markus Ruch, whose iconoclastic takes on both are making waves in the country’s northernmost AOC.

We are, as ever, awed and humbled by the generosity and talent of our contributors and partners, and grateful for the support you, our TRINK community, give us.  We welcome your feedback, interests, and story pitches. Please drop us a line at [email protected].

Happy Reading!

Paula Redes Sidore, Bad Honnef
Valerie Kathawala, New York

  • Markus Ruch

    ByDaniel Schönberger

    Swiss wines remain rare on the international wine scene. But a new generation of talent committed to uncompromising work and meaningfully sustainable viticulture is slowly changing this.  Markus Ruch has been cultivating his own vineyards in the Klettgau, part of Switzerland’s northernmost canton, since 2007. He is widely credited with producing the first Swiss natural wines and leads the movement today. His Pinot Noirs and orange Amphore are served from NOMA in Copenhagen to Konstantin Filippou in Vienna. Ruch’s wines are classy. With a twist. For those less familiar with Swiss geography, the canton of Schaffhausen is situated north of…...

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    ​3 Can’t-Miss Wines from Carnuntum​

    ByDaniela Dejnega

    ​The little wine region of Carnuntum sits east of Vienna and south of the Danube. With a mere 900 hectares under vine, it distinguishes itself through an awareness of regionality developed early on. In 1992, when Austria was still largely classifying its wines by variety rather than origin, Carnuntum implemented the idea of a regionally typical red wine with the name Rubin Carnuntum. But reaching DAC origin status – oriented to the regional, village, single-vineyard wine concept – was still a long road away. This only took effect in 2019 and today Zweigelt Rubin Carnuntum is a regional wine. Although white…...

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    12 Questions for Terry Theise

    ByValerie Kathawala

    Terry Theise. Until quite recently, I would have written “an importer of German and Austrian wine who needs no introduction.”  But over the past year, the axis of wine, not to mention the world, has shifted. A slew of new wine lovers might just need to be brought up to speed on this pioneering champion of “umlaut-bearing wines” (a term Theise coined long before we or anyone else). Theise fell for German wine and wine culture while living in Munich in his 20s. When he returned to the U.S. in the early 1980s, he brought this zeal back with him. He…...

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    Swabian Vibes

    ByKatharina Matheis

    Those who go on the hunt for modern Württemberg may be surprised by what they find on the journey. In this stretch of southern Germany, many things work differently. Swabians have their own take on cool.  Here you’ll meet a grower from the hip-hop scene who has the region’s traditional wine mug inked as a tattoo. You’ll bump into a start-up winery launched with crowdfunding. And you’ll land at the door of one of Germany’s hippest growers, 68-year-old Helmut Dolde of Linsenhofen. DOLDE Dolde wears a walrus mustache and, on the day of my visit, a cap someone gave him that says “Wine in…...

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    Beethoven as Bacchus

    ByRon Merlino

    On the dark morning of March 26, 1827, a heavy snowstorm was falling outside the fogged window panes of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Vienna apartment. Everything was unusually quiet in this space, so customarily filled with music. Beethoven’s house servant walked into the room to announce that a long-awaited shipment of Rheingau Rieslings, wines sent at his behest by his music publisher Schott, had just arrived. Barely able to muster the energy, the composer sat up in his bed, shook his fist in anger, and muttered these very last words: “Pity, pity, it’s too late…”     He sank back into his bed,…...

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    EAT & TRINK | Pfalz Riesling and Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup

    ByJoyce Lin

    If you ask a person from Taiwan to choose the 10 dishes that best represent his or her cuisine, Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup is inevitably on the list. More than a beloved national dish, the soup has become something of an obsession — like pizza to New Yorkers.  Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup was created by soldiers who retreated with the Nationalist government from mainland China to Taiwan in the 1950s. For political reasons, they were banned from returning to their hometowns. Missing both family and familiar cuisine, the soldiers used local ingredients to create a dish that evoked the flavors…...

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  • Winners and Losers of the Revised German Wine Law

    BySteven Sidore

    Roughly once a generation, the German government pops the hood on the country’s wine law for a tune up. 2021 is one such year, with a new set of revisions taking effect in early May. On the surface, the changes appear more incremental than revolutionary. Yet controversy has followed as various stakeholders realize that some new wrinkles may have unexpectedly far-reaching consequences. So let’s pour ourselves a glass of dry wine (law) and savor some juicy power dynamics.  Here are the early winners and losers of the 2021 German Wine Act. Winner: The VDP’S Long Game You can’t say the…...

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  • Swiss Wine Trends

    ByPaula Redes Sidore

    ​It would be easy to dismiss what happens in the tiny winegrowing country of Switzerland as an inconsequential alpine eddy, an iridescent surge in the great river of wine. After all, the nation boasts a mere 15,000 hectares of vines, ranking it only 132nd worldwide in terms of area. But do so at your own peril. After all, the Rhine itself begins in this country, high in the hills of Graubünden some 120 km due south of Switzerland’s capital city. In that spot, it is little more than a spring-fed stream off Lake Toma. “To me, the Rhine looks very…...

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    When Vermouth was Spelled Wermut

    ByPhilippe Grandbois

    It was the first hour of my first shift, and of course, it was a “Manhattan Cocktail.” I pictured the flashcards heavy in my pocket from the cram-session the night before:  Rye whisky,  sweet Vermouth, and bitters. Don’t forget the cherry.  To that point, I had known Vermouth as little more than a grandmother’s drink, the bottle dying a slow oxidative death in wood-paneled curios around the world. So after making the guest’s request, and in the name of job experience, I downed the remaining jigger of inexperienced overpour. Later, I would comment to the bar manager that it tasted a…...

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