Nils Kevin Puls

Kevin Puls works in advertising and PR. His passion for Austrian wine began nearly two decades ago and he’s regularly tasted the vintages of the Alpenrepublik from the Wachau to Styria. His weakness for estates that work organically and for natural wines started with Gut Oggau’s 2007 vintage. He’s also a regular visitor to Franken. He blogs about food, wine, and the people who make them.

Germany · Climate Crisis · Switzerland · Uncategorized

Luckily, Petite Arvine Likes It Hot
ByNils Kevin Puls September 30, 2026October 7, 2026

As more cool-climate regions like Germany's Mittelrhein seek grapes that can beat the heat, the rare Swiss variety Petite Arvine offers a surprising possibility.

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Austria · Germany · Italy

Flavescence dorée: A Viticultural Murder Mystery
ByNils Kevin Puls December 16, 2025

In slanting early morning light, a shadow crosses a vineyard. The figure moves row by row, ripping out vines and casting them onto a large, burning pyre. The blaze stretches to greet the sun as it rises above a mountainous horizon. There is fire from all points of the compass. Death is in the air. The culprit is a phytoplasm fatal to Vinifera vines. Its spread is aided by the American grapevine leafhopper (Scaphoideus titanus), a dwarf cicada native to North America. As it feasts on the vines, it transmits the pathogen of what is known in German as Goldgelbe…...

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Italy · Alto Adige

Is Summa the Future of Wine Fairs?
ByNils Kevin Puls July 5, 2024July 5, 2024

Gatherings dedicated to wines outside the mainstream have become ubiquitous. Even so, one fair seems to cut through the noise: Summa. This small event, held each spring ahead of the global trade convention Vinitaly, has established itself as the grande dame of the alternative wine scene. But it’s fair to ask: with so much competition, does Summa still shine? It’s early April and the sun glistens on the peaks of the Alps, which remain white even now. On the southbound train from Bozen, the mood is good. It’s 10 am but temperatures have already reached high-summer levels. Arriving in the…...

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Austria · Styria

Steiermark: Two Hearts, One Soul
ByNils Kevin Puls January 23, 2024January 5, 2026

"It’s not about Südsteiermark or Untersteiermark. It’s about wine.”

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Rheinhessen

Ingelheim: The Spätburgunder Hotspot You’ve Never Heard of
ByNils Kevin Puls October 18, 2023September 16, 2024

Ingelheim Rheinhessen is a hotspot for German Pinot Noir (Spätburgunder).

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Austria

Is It Time for Screwcaps on Fine Wine?
ByNils Kevin Puls May 31, 2023January 5, 2026

Screwcaps for fine wine are making a comeback. Do these cheap and cheerful closures have what it takes for the long run?

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Austria · Thermenregion

Discovering Austria’s Thermenregion
ByNils Kevin Puls February 15, 2023January 5, 2026

To mark a recent milestone anniversary, Austria’s association of traditional wine estates (ÖTW) invited into its fold a region that is in many regards the epitome of Herkunft, or origins. The Thermenregion, often held up as Austria’s Burgundy, brings a suitably deep and glorious wine tradition. The ÖTW’s intake process for the Thermenregion is in the final stages of fine-tuning, reports chairman Michael Moosbrugger. Most likely, white wines from Erste Lage, or premier cru, sites from the 2022 vintage will be the first to be classified, followed by the reds. “In joining the ÖTW, it was crucial that the region’s…...

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Germany · Pfalz

Oliver Zeter’s Mise En Pfalz
ByNils Kevin Puls November 16, 2022November 11, 2023

Zeter assesses the natural bounty of his home, the Pfalz, with the eye of a chef. The soils are his mise en place — the basis of his work — the grape varieties are the ingredients he brings to the table and the bottle. His favorite ingredient — Sauvignon Blanc — has become his trademark. This love came early: in South Africa, 1992, at the Buitenverwachting winery in Cape Town. Now, he is celebrating 15 years as a Sauvignon Blanc iconoclast himself. A recent vertical tasting spanning his first vintage in 2007 to the current release, 2021, made clear the value of following palate…...

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Austria · Germany

Rotling Outlaws
ByNils Kevin Puls July 21, 2022January 9, 2026

The sun blazes. The air shimmers. On the horizon four figures throw long shadows across the dry, crumbling ground. They are headed toward a city. Doors swing open. The four step from light into dark, their throats dusty and dry. Behind a deserted bar stands a man. He pushes four full glasses over to them. Out of the glasses sloshes a wine as red as the setting sun. If you aren’t thirsty by now, you should at least be hearing the melody of a harmonica. This is how the opening scene of a revival—the Rotling revival—could begin. The four men…...

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Austria · Traisental

Austria’s Traisental
ByNils Kevin Puls May 11, 2022February 17, 2024

Wine regions are threaded along the Danube, one after another, like a string of Chanel pearls. Wagram, Kamptal, Kremstal, Wachau. And Traisental — the only one that lies exclusively south of the Danube. Its namesake river, the Traisen, divides the valley as the Seine does Paris or the Gironde does Bordeaux, into left and right banks. The tiny region flaunts French finesse and cool avant-garde. But also a rustic, down-to-earth charm. In Paris, the Left Bank is the quartier of intellectuals and artists. Through Yves Saint Laurent it achieved world fame in fashion. Who or what sets the tone and…...

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Austria · Germany

The New Teachings of Old Field Blends
ByNils Kevin Puls December 17, 2021January 9, 2026

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…...

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Austria

Non-vintage Is Timeless
ByNils Kevin Puls June 23, 2021October 15, 2023

Was everything really better in the past? Well, people were at least more patient. Vaccines were developed over the course of years. Under Communism in eastern Germany it could take up to a decade to get a car. OK, bad examples. But even food and drink were given more time. Today, fermentation and preservation are back on the front burner in kitchens — and in cellars, too. Vintners typically work within the natural rhythms of the year, giving their wines time in cask or tank until just before the next harvest. But some are stepping deeper into the past…...

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Germany · Rheingau · Rheinhessen

What is the Role of “Heimat” in Terroir?
ByNils Kevin Puls April 7, 2021January 5, 2026

For over a year, we’ve been living with a pandemic that has shut down more than just our senses of taste and smell. It has forced us to rely on at-home experiences like a glass of wine to satisfy our longing for travel. But what do the places of our terroir dreams taste like? What exactly constitutes the origins of a wine? To use a loaded German word, how much Heimat (loosely, homeland) is in terroir? Flash back to harvest 2012. Max von Kunow of Weingut von Hövel in Germany’s Saar visits the Jurtschitsch family in Austria’s Kamptal for a vacation before his own harvest. Together…...

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Austria · Burgenland

Weingut Heinrich: Finding Freedom in Less
ByNils Kevin Puls December 14, 2020January 5, 2026

It takes little to be happy. And he who is happy is king.” This 19th-century German song – with just two lines – expresses how good a simple life, with little, can be. Just how little is something each of us has experienced, almost daily, this year. Finding the joy in this can be difficult, and regrettably few have managed to perceive the freedom in “less.” Two people who did so long ago are Heike und Gernot Heinrich of Weingut Heinrich in Austria’s Burgenland. I visited them in early September, during Europe’s pandemic lull. The timing couldn’t have been better…....

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Nils Kevin Puls

Luckily, Petite Arvine Likes It Hot

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Flavescence dorée: A Viticultural Murder Mystery

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Is Summa the Future of Wine Fairs?

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Steiermark: Two Hearts, One Soul

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Ingelheim: The Spätburgunder Hotspot You’ve Never Heard of

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Is It Time for Screwcaps on Fine Wine?

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Discovering Austria’s Thermenregion

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Oliver Zeter’s Mise En Pfalz

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Rotling Outlaws

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Austria’s Traisental

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The New Teachings of Old Field Blends

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Non-vintage Is Timeless

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What is the Role of “Heimat” in Terroir?

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Weingut Heinrich: Finding Freedom in Less

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