FYI/FYE April 2009 WINES OF THE TIMES If It.s Spring, It Must Be Riesling By ERIC ASIMOV IF you.ve already heard me sing the song of German riesling in the springtime, you.ll have to forgive me. But it.s a song that bears repeating . at least annually . because it simply is a perfect seasonal melody in almost all of its manifestations. What do I mean by that? Well, no wine is more versatile than German riesling. It doesn.t just excel as a sweet wine and a dry wine, it excels at many different degrees of sweetness and dryness. And at each stop on the spectrum from dry to sweet, you have a wine of a different character, with different qualities, filling different needs and offering different pleasures. That.s why I can write about German rieslings every spring and never feel as if I.m repeating myself (at least, not to my ears). Why, last year I wrote about dry German rieslings. The truth is, even though many people assume all German rieslings are sweet, most of the rieslings that people drink in Germany are dry. The best of these are exceptionally delicious. The year before, I wrote about auslese rieslings, highly misunderstood wines that have a lot of residual sugar but are so well balanced that they do wonderfully at the table. Before that it was kabinett rieslings, the delicate, almost fragile wines that have always epitomized spring with their almost hesitant bit of sweetness, peeking through like a new bud. Our subject this year is späese, perhaps the most appealing expression of German riesling, except for the others I.ve mentioned. The term späese (pronounced SHPATE-lay-zuh) refers to the degree of ripeness at which the grapes are harvested. In the German system of ripeness classification, the grapes with the least amount of sugar are destined for kabinett wines. Then comes späese, and then the riper auslese, beerenauslese, trockenbeerenauslese and eiswein. Yes indeed, they are a mouthful. What.s more, these terms, particularly späese, don.t always tell you how a wine will actually taste because they describe the grapes before fermentation. It.s up to the winemaker to decide whether to stop fermentation early on, leaving a considerable amount of residual sugar, or to ferment the wine longer, until it is completely dry. For that reason, German wine labels may offer an additional designation indicating that a späese is almost dry (späese halbtrocken) or that it is bone dry (späese trocken). To make matters even more complicated, some producers of dry riesling opt out of these ripeness designations and use a completely different nomenclature for their wines. That.s the beauty of the German system: You keep banging your head against a wall of terminology, and just at the point it begins to really hurt you figure it all out. The wine panel was feeling no pain recently when we tasted 25 späese rieslings from the 2007 vintage. We focused on späeses in their most familiar guise for Americans, that is, wines with a fair amount of residual sugar. For the tasting Florence Fabricant and I were joined by Fred Dexheimer, a wine consultant, and Laura Maniec, director of wine and spirits for B. R. Guest Restaurants. While I said that these wines had a lot of residual sugar, they are not exactly sweet wines. Riesling has a naturally high acidity to it, which gives the wines a zesty liveliness that balances the sweetness, leaving the wine refreshing and invigorating. The best of these wines are not merely balanced but thrillingly so, like a teeter-totter on the point of a skyscraper. Our No. 1 wine, the Bockenauer Felseneck from Schär-Fröch in Nahe, was supremely delicate, combining a feather lightness more typical of the Mosel-Saar-Ruwer region with a wonderful richness of flavor. The Mosel is probably the German region most familiar to Americans. Of the 25 bottles we tasted, 18 were from the Mosel, 4 from Nahe and one each from the Rheingau and Rheinhessen. Our No. 2 wine, the Üziger Wüten from Joh. Jos. Christoffel Erben, epitomized the finesse and nuance typical of the Mosel. It was our best value at $29. By contrast, our No. 3 wine, the Bernkasteler Doctor from Wegeler, was the most expensive bottle by far at $90. It is a beautiful wine, but the painfully high price is for the famous Doctor vineyard. Despite all of these wonderful things about German riesling, and despite the fact that Americans are drinking more riesling than ever before, many people remain confused about German rieslings. Nonetheless, one thing is invariably true with wines like these späeses. .One thing you do know, which is really bankable, is you.re not going to get high alcohol and you.re not going to get oak,. Laura said. Indeed, none of these wines were above 9.5 percent alcohol, and most were 8 percent and under. Did somebody say lunch? The wines on the whole were so good that, in addition to the producers on our list, I.d also recommend Selbach-Oster, St. Urbans-Hof, A. J. Adam and Reichsgraf von Kesselstatt. Germany has been enjoying some good vintages in recent years, and 2007 seems to have been extremely kind to späeses. Most of the wines we liked best are deliciously vivacious right now, with one proviso that I.ll get to in a moment. But very soon, if these wines behave as German rieslings typically do, they will enter a kind of neutral, silent period only to emerge in five to seven years as beautifully refined wines. Yes, it.s a pain to wait, but the rewards can be tremendous. That proviso? Well, some German producers use a lot of sulfur dioxide as a preservative, which can make a young wine unpleasant. One of my favorite Mosel producers, Joh. Jos. Prü notorious for this. Indeed, we had two Prütleses in our blind tasting. In my notes, I called both of these sulfur bombs. But in my experience with Prü years from now these wines will both be gorgeous. Tasting Report: Following the Umlauts Schär-Fröch Nahe Bockenauer Felseneck Späese 2007 $40 *** 1/2 Lacy, delicate and almost fragile, with beautiful aromas and flavors of flowers, ginger and minerals. (Importer: Rudi Wiest/Cellars International, San Marcos, Calif.) BEST VALUE Joh. Jos. Christoffel Erben Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Üziger Wüten Späese 2007 $29 *** 1/2 Complex and nuanced with juicy peach, apricot and mineral flavors. (Terry Theise/Michael Skurnik Wines, Syosset, N.Y.) Wegeler Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Bernkasteler Doctor Späese 2007 $90 *** Delicate with lovely, lingering flavors of lime, spices and apricots. (Rudi Wiest/Cellars International) Dr. Loosen Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Üziger Wüten Späese 2007 $31 *** Well-balanced aromas and flavors of ripe fruit, citrus and slate. (Lauber Imports, Somerville, N.J.) Schloss Lieser Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Brauneberger Juffer-Sonnenuhr Späese 2007 $40 *** Lacy Mosel fragility with citrus and mineral flavors. (Rudi Wiest/Cellars International) Hexamer Nahe Meddersheimer Rheingrafenberg Späese 2007 $33 *** More intense than delicate with peach, apricot and mineral flavors. (Terry Theise/Michael Skurnik Wines) Fritz Haag Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Brauneberger Juffer-Sonnenuhr Späese 2007 $38 *** Knife-edge balance of sweet and zesty with flavors of peaches, apricots and minerals. (Rudi Wiest/Cellars International) Josef Leitz Rheingau Rüimer Berg Roseneck Späese 2007 $40 *** Gorgeous yet balanced flavors of voluptuous ripe fruit, spices, minerals and flowers. (Terry Theise/Michael Skurnik Wines) Willi Schaefer Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Graacher Domprobst Späese 2007 $35 ** 1/2 Poised and balanced with spicy peach and mineral flavors. (Terry Theise/Michael Skurnik Wines) Döoff Nahe Niederhäer Hermannshö Späese 2007 $68 ** 1/2 Rip e and fleshy with persistent flavors of pears, herbs and minerals. (Terry Theise/Michael Skurnik Wines) WHAT THE STARS MEAN: Ratings, from zero to four stars, reflect the panel.s reaction to the wines, which were tasted with names and vintages concealed. The wines represent a selection generally available in good retail shops and restaurants and on the Internet. Prices are those paid in shops in the New York region. Tasting coordinator: Bernard Kirsch -- ------------------------------ * Dr. James Ellingson, jellings(a)me.umn.edu * * University of Minnesota, mobile : 651/645-0753 * * Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *