What You’re Still Getting Wrong About Trollinger
Trollinger was long decried as a poor excuse of a wine. Increasingly, growers and drinkers beg to differ.
Trollinger was long decried as a poor excuse of a wine. Increasingly, growers and drinkers beg to differ.
Rainer Schäfer writes about what he values most: wine, food, and soccer. The first wine that impressed him as a teenager was a Silvaner from Endingen, grown in the vineyard of his Kaiserstühl relatives. He's lived in Hamburg for 30 years and travels the wine regions of the world, always curious about dazzling personalities, surprising experiences, and unknown pleasures.
Whether you’re dropping into town for the bacchanalia that is Rieslingfeier or you’re a native New Yorker curious to get a taste of the latest and greatest in German and Austrian wines, here’s your hit list of bars and restaurants that make NYC the country’s best (if priciest) city to drink auf Deutsch. Updated November 2025 to remove Koloman, which has closed. G = German focus A = Austrian focus Noreetuh (G) Manager and co-owner Jin Ahn has turned this decade-old Lower East Side Hawaiian spot into the city’s ultimate insider Riesling hangout. Ahn’s exceptionally well-informed list is divided into Rieslings…...
Sammie Steinmetz is one half of Weingut Günther Steinmetz, a mid-sized, family-run winery in Brauneberg on the Mosel. Born in Pensacola, Florida, Sammie came to Germany in 2007 as an enlisted member of the U.S. Air Force, stationed at Spangdahlem Air Base not far from the winery. She’d already planned on settling in the country when her term of service ended (“because Riesling,” she laughs). But a chance invitation to a wine-tasting introduced her to fifth-generation winemaker Stefan Steinmetz. Two weeks after meeting, they were dating and they married a few years later. In 2014, Sammie took early retirement from the…...
Words are like viruses. They appear in culture and may lie dormant then suddenly they are everywhere, swirling about, adapting to their hosts, mutating to survive. In the wine world, this process can happen fast. "Purity," it turns out, is anything but pure.
Slopes tilting toward shimmering water; a long, cool growing season; and shallow slate soil — to a connoisseur of German wines, these features immediately evoke the storied Mosel region. Yet they also describe a much younger wine-growing area: New York State’s Finger Lakes, or FLX. Long dismissed as a producer of tourist-friendly sweet wines made from non-vinifera grapes, the Finger Lakes now give life to vintages that express grape and terroir with nuance and sophistication. These include wines created by German-born winemakers, such as Johannes Reinhardt at Kemmeter Wines and Peter Weis at Weis Vineyards, as well as those who trained…...
Melanie Broyé-Engelkes, a seasoned marketing executive and entrepreneur from Paris and Luise Böhme, a former nationally competitive athlete from eastern Germany, have joined Theresa Olkus, a communications specialist from Württemberg, to form a triumverate that — in ways large and small — now steers the future of German wine.
Why does biodynamics matter? Respekt-BIODYN is the ongoing effort of 25 growers from German-speaking wine regions to answer that question. Though there are many forms of holistic farming that benefit people, planet, vines and wines, this tight-knit Austria-based group believes that a shared commitment to viewing the teachings of philosopher and agricultural reformer Rudolf Steiner as a springboard for exchange, cooperation, shared learning, and support helps cultivate a sense of individuality that, ultimately, translates into more profound terroir expression and higher quality in their wines. Biodynamic Origins “The first 12 winemakers started in 2005,” explains the group’s leader, Michael Goëss-Enzenberg…...
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