L-R: Greiner, Näkel, Fürst, Viehhauser, Heger

Top German spätburgunder (pinot noir) producers from the Ahr to Baden came to London to present their wines at a Master of Wine Masterclass on Sept 11, 2009.

Presenting their wines (north to south) were:
Meike Näkel of Weingut Mayer-Näkel (Ahr)
Dieter Greiner of Kloster Eberbach (Rheingau)
Paul Fürst of Weingut Rudolf Fürst (Franken)
Yquem Viehhauser of Weingut Bernhard Huber (Baden)
Joachim Heger of Weingut Dr. Heger (Baden)

Germany has an historic heritage of spätburgunder (pinot noir) production, stretching back 700 years and more, when Cistercian monks first took their grapes with them from Burgundy.

But the country’s ascendency to emerging world class spätburgunders largely dates from the late 1980s, as Joachim Heger of Weingut Dr. Heger in Baden explained: “We had very good wines in the old days. Then there was a period of time that was not as strong. In the 1950s, most German reds came from heated must. The wine was drinkable in March after the harvest. People added sugar to the wines so they didn’t do the malolactic fermentation. That was style of pinot noir. Nobody kept wine in bottle.

“In the late 80s and early 90s Germans came back to fermenting skins with the must, to take colour from the skins by alcohol not by heat. Since then, there has been a big development.”

In this respect, German spätburgunder is ‘newer’ than parts of the new world, though many of the best sites are matched to spätburgunder, so those centuries served a significant purpose.

Germany has the third largest plantings of pinot noir in the world (after France, and post-Sideways USA), but the variety has always played second fiddle to riesling. Spätburgunder is the most widely planted black grape variety in Germany, with 11,820ha, slowly increasing over the past five years. It accounts for 12% of the country’s total vineyard area, and 1/3rd of the black grape plantings.

Dernauer Pfarrwingert, Ahr

Ahr is the northernmost region growing pinot noir, north of the 50° line latitude. The cycle of vine-growing here is two to three weeks behind the southern parts of Baden, some 400km further south. Meike Näkel, whose father started the Mayer-Näkel estate said: “the steep slopes give a high sun intensity. The slate soils conserve heat and reflect it back, so we have higher average temperatures than the surrounding areas.”

A persistent theme for the seminar was changing viticultural and winemaking practices in the last quarter of a century. Meike said: “Before 2002, we used a maximum 11 months’ barrique ageing, but since then, it’s up to 16 months to give the wine more tannin from the oak. We also changed the maceration time to about 21 days including a short pre-fermentation maceration, and cooling time at the end of fermentation. We started making everything longer to give our wines more substance and the ability to age a little longer as well.” In the northern Ahr, the fruit/acid razor edge exists, with the winery working on those other elements of structure.

At Rheingau’s Kloster Eberbach, not so distant from the Ahr, and also on slate soils, a theme of perfumed elegance persisted in the wines.  For this estate, said its managing director, Dieter Greiner “the intensity of how we work in the vineyard has changed dramatically in the last 20 years. Such as cutting grape bunches in half [to limit yield], and removing leaves.”

Assmannshausen Höllenberg, Rheingau

Some clones of spätburgunder, as in France, had been bred for quantity.  So Greiner added “it depends on the clones. Some were bred for high yields. Others, like clone 18 or 20 from Geisenheim, have intense aroma but very big berries. With these clones you have to do a green harvest, even in this year when we had a strong flowering period.”

For Weingut Bernhard Huber, in Baden, Yquem Viehhauser said such vineyard work is “much more intensive than harvest. It’s 120 to 130 hours per hectare, but it’s worth it.”

In addition to cutting the bunches, Meike added “what else helps us to keep the berries small is removing some leaves during or directly after flowering. The vines get a small shock and give energy to producing more leaves and not into giving energy to the grapes to get bigger.”

Over in Franken Paul Furst is a leading spätburgunder light.  Though his family have been making wine since 1638, his own expertise has changed dramatically.  “When I was studying, the knowledge to make pinot noir was the same as making riesling [i.e. essentially made as a white wine]. It was the late 80s when making good red wine in Germany came to involve long maceration and deep colour.” But now, he added “the main focus in the work of my son and I is the freshness in pinot noir, the silkiness, and a good acidity which is not sour. We’re working for elegance and a fine long aftertaste.”

Centgrafenberg, Franken

Tannin management has changed towards achieving this aim. A five-to-seven day pre-fermentation cold soak is now the order of the day before fermentation in old wooden cuves using a proportion of whole bunches, which Paul said bring freshness to the wine.  And for Paul “the barrel helps the wine to become balanced and round. It’s important for the wine to stay the whole 16 months on lees without rackings, and for the best wines we use 100% new French oak.”

It is Baden which has the most spätburgunder plantings, half of all of them. The southern parts of this region are 100km north of Burgundy, with more rain because of the foothills of the Black Forest. Here Weingut Bernhard Huber also use a proportion of whole clusters. Yquem said “for the 2005 Hecklinger Schlossberg we used nearly 70% whole clusters. We like the tannins of the stems working with the oak for complexity.”

A more recent change at this winery is to vinify and bottle vineyard sites separately. Yquem said: “until 2004 we had three different pinot noirs, a basic one, like a ‘villages’ then a ‘premier cru’ and a ‘grand cru’. Since 2004, we started to separate the sites. Now the Reserve [with vineyard site] at our winery is a synonym for grosses gewaches/grand cru.”

Weingut Dr. Heger is a bit further south than Huber, in the warmest part of Germany.  Owner Joachim Heger chose his wines specifically to encapsulate the changing attitudes to vinification over the past decades, from the ‘high tech’ 1993 in fermenter with long maceration to extract colour and tannin, to the  ‘low tech’ temperature-controlled, hand punch-down, earlier harvested fruit for greater elegance.

Ihringer Winklerberg, Baden

The 1993 had almost four weeks of maceration, with no pre-fermentation cold soak.  Joachim said: “You get a good colour and it seems to be fresh but there are green tannins in the wine.” He added “It was the way we vinified the wines in this period of time.”

By 1999, he said “we didn’t want the green tannins. We fermented the wine in wooden cuves, but there was no temperature control, and it got very hot.”  By 2005, temperature control is in place and grapes are harvested earlier to preserve the natural freshness of higher acidity.

As to future winemaking, Joachim said: “taking the 2005, 2006 and 2007 we have more complexity and more freshness; more silkiness, and not too much tannin but enough tannin that the wine has enough structure.”

The 2005 was looking great. I’m not convinced pinot noir can support long, dark extractions and keep its aromatic integrity.

Tasting notes

The temporal evolution on the evidence of this tasting is the aim for a more elegant, ethereal, perfumed style of pinot noir. Both vineyard work to limit yield and enhance acidity (further south)/adding structural oak (further north), as well as gentler extraction techniques in the winery are resulting in wine with a more classic paler colour, more perfume, and sufficient tannin to support, rather than constrict, the fruit-acid balancing act that is so crucial for pinot noir.

Weingut Meyer-Näkel, Ahr

Dernauer Pfarrwingert Spätburgunder Grosses Gewächs 2007
Cherry blossom perfume, elegant allspice attack. Silky texture with warm, fresh feel. Bright red fruits becoming more perfumed in the glass.

Dernauer Pfarrwingert Spätburgunder Grosses Gewächs 2007
A warmer vintage. Dry-baked cherry, lush fruit, with attractive balance. Harvested end October for that richer balance.  Still very youthful with long, warm finish of succulent fruit.

Dernauer Pfarrwingert Spätburgunder Grosses Gewächs 2004
Smoky, tar nose with black cherry.  Elegance and structure and fineness of acid core, with just the beginnings of a developing meaty note.  Perfumed red cherry, linear acidity with the flesh of fruit surrounding the core.

Dernauer Pfarrwingert Spätburgunder Grosses Gewächs 1999
Lifted earthy notes, with sweet base texture opening up.  I’m beamed up to creamy Portobello mushrooms tasting this wine. Before 2002, wines generally underwent 11 months barrel maturation, subsequently increased to nearer 16 months.

Kloster Eberbach, Rheingau

Assmannshäuser Höllenberg Spätburgunder, 2005
Gunflint smoke aroma, elegantly medium bodied with lush red cherry and strawberry fruit. Quite complete, balanced, perfumed.

Assmannshäuser Höllenberg Spätburgunder, 2003
Warmth, rumtoph fruit of the vintage, still with mouthfeel and profile of a fine wine.  Compare with 1959 and 1947, also hot vintages.

Assmannshäuser Höllenberg Spätburgunder, 1989
Bricking/orange rim with aromatic wild strawberry perfume, with a palate like being enveloped in a silk blanket. And with fruit that blossoms in the medium bodied palate.

Assmannshäuser Höllenberg Spätburgunder, 1959
Brick to orange rim. Barbecue sauce smokiness giving way to sweet fruit.  Remarkable to taste, balanced with expressive fruit blending with the aromatic smokiness.

Weingut Rudolf Fürst, Franken

Spätburgunder R Centgrafenberg, Grosses Gewächs 2007
Sweet spice from oak in a more modern expression of the style, with slightly grippier tannins than seen in earlier wines, above. Warm berry fruits with freshness and length.

Spätburgunder R Centgrafenberg, Grosses Gewächs 2005
Purple fruit, sweet redcurrants in spicily balanced, youthful wine of medium to full body.  This wine is beginning to come into its own, filling out its body.

Spätburgunder R Centgrafenberg, Grosses Gewächs 2003
Steeped red fruits with a minty note and spicy background. Feeling the warmth of the vintage.

Spätburgunder R Centgrafenberg, Grosses Gewächs 1997
Spicy, dark berries, becoming more muscular in style.

Weingut Bernhard Huber, Baden

Hecklinger Schlossberg Spätburgunder ‘Reserve’ Qba Trocken 2006
Warm, fragrant, red cherry nose with bright, sparky fruit on the palate.  Tight and focused. Very young.

Hecklinger Schlossberg Spätburgunder ‘Reserve’ Qba Trocken 2005
Bright cherry, fruit forward, beginning to open up into its quite full body.

Spätburgunder ‘Reserve’ Qba Trocken 2001
Dry-toast smoke on the nose; beautifully balanced full body with intense berry fruits. Complete and à point with all components integrated and harmonious.

Spätburgunder ‘Reserve’ Qba Trocken 1990
This was recently recorked and topped with sulphur dioxide.  Not showing at its reputed best.

Weingut Dr. Heger, Baden

Achkarrer Schlossberg Spätburgunder *** Qba Trocken, 2005
Intensely perfumed, aromatic wild strawberries. Elegant, lightly medium bodied, well balanced with lengthy finish.

Ihringer Winklerberg Spätburgunder *** QbA Trocken, 2001
Perfumed, sweet fruit, with sweetness of fruit detracting a little for me.

Ihringer Winklerberg Spätburgunder *** QbA Trocken, 1999
Lifted spicy warm fruit, almost rumtoph-like.

Ihringer Winklerberg Spätburgunder *** Spätlese Trocken, 1993
Deeper colour, quite grippy with lifted savoury notes.

Even in recession-hit 2009, wine exports from Germany are  holding steady as the trend to fresh, refreshing, fruity wines continues to grow.  It looks as though we are finally beginning to realise Germany offers fresh, unoaked styles of wine, without the massively high alcohols that can give heat to the palate rather than flavour.

Slopes are important in Germany

Germany’s heritage of producing the greatest rieslings in the world is undoubted. They used to command the highest prices in Europe. Rieslings are again going from strength to strength in the UK, and this includes the traditional styles with some residual sweetness, which are popular with the under 35s, who seem to love trying these wines without the hang-ups that some of the over 35s still seem to have.  With light alcohol, these styles are ideal for lunchtime wines and for the popular gastropub culture. It seems the UK is almost the last to catch on to these light, refreshing, fruity styles of riesling.

But what few realise is that Germany also has a long heritage of producing red wines, although until recently, these were rarely found on any of the export markets.  But that looks set to change.  The last quarter of a century has seen some dynamic changes in the entire approach to red wine making style and quality.

PRESSING THE CHANGES

Just 30 years ago red grape varieties accounted for a little over 10% of the vineyard.   Rainer Lingenfelder of his eponymous estate in the Pfalz explained: “Red wine is not new, however there was a renaissance in red wine starting in mid 1980s. I was one of the growers who wanted to revive the red wine tradition in Germany.” As he’d already worked in Australia and at Grand Puy Lacoste in Bordeaux, he was in a good position to see the potential for red German wines.

In the early 1980s, the way to make red wines was to make them like white wine. Lingenfelder said: “German reds were nothing but a coloured white. Tannins were considered undesirable; malolactic fermentation was a no-no, so a typical pinot noir had considerable acidity, a very, very light colour, and the fruit was nicely ripe for spätlese (late harvest).  It would have been made in sweet style.  So German reds were  pale, with high acidity, some sweetness and no tannin.”  To international markets these would certainly not have been a desirable option.

A handful of forward-thinking producers knew they had to make red wine differently from white. As well as colour, Lingenfelder said they needed “structure, tannin, a completely different body. The key changes were lower yields in the vineyard, a classical fermentation on skins, and a reasonably long fermentation. Malolactic fermentation to reduce the fruity acids (malic), because malic acid collides with tannic acid on palate.  You can’t have both malic and tannic acids. Thirdly oak ageing.”

Lingenfelder said: “It was not the suitability of soil or lack of warmth. Pinot noir ripens properly in Baden, the Pfalz etc.  It was in our minds.  Having gone abroad, we could see from a different angle.  So the time was just ready.”

A quarter of a century later the evidence for good quality red wines is in the bag. Within Germany, some of them are fetching Burgundy 1er cru prices. Initially the demand was so high at home there was no need to export, and there probably still isn’t, but cracking export markets add prestige and profile to a producer, especially such a hard nut to crack as the UK market, where wines from all over the world are present in abundance.

Pfalz

RED GRAPE VARIETIES

While riesling has 20% of the vineyard plantings, red grape varieties are grown on more than a third of Germany’s vineyard area. Pinot noir, called spätburgunder, is the main one, with 11% of plantings, and there has been a big increase in plantings of dornfelder, more than doubling in the last five years, to account for 8% of total plantings. Even the likes of merlot and cabernet sauvignon have appeared since the new millennium, in very small quantities, and restricted to the warmer, more southerly regions such as Baden and the Pfalz.   

Pinot noir/spätburgunder: The best examples are from the Ahr, Rheingau, Pfalz, and Baden regions. Like riesling, it is a variety that is influenced by the terroir. Paul Fürst comments: “pinot noir is always a hand crafted wine. You have to work with the soil and the vine. Good pinot noir is always expensive, when you want minerality and elegance. We are always looking for low yields and thick skins on the bunch.”

Dornfelder: This is a vine crossing from the 1950s, and is a household name in Germany.  It is a deeply coloured variety with good levels of acidity and an aromatic, cherry fruit profile with smooth-textured tannins. The best examples can benefit from barrel ageing which give more grip and structure.  It’s easy to grow and easy to drink, generally having about 12%-12.5% alcohol.

The best reds are found in pockets all over the country, notably the Ahr, Pfalz and Baden. And Rudolf Fürst in Franken deserves special mention. Owner Paul Fürst said: “the western part of Franken is traditionally a red wine area, on red sandstone soil. The only interesting places for red wines are where you find strong soils, e.g. Ahr, Assmannshuasen in the Rheingau, parts of Pfalz and Baden. They make very different types of pinot noir. My type is strong, elegant, with wonderful colour and minerality, very long. 20 years ago we started with small barrels, and now have between 30-100% new oak.”

The small Ahr valley is the renowned red wine region of Germany, with 90% of its vineyard planted to red grapes.  It is one of the most northerly regions in Europe, further north than the Mosel Valley, and it has a special microclimate that allows red grapes to ripen.  Unusually, pinot noir here is planted in slate, which adds a mineral quality, fruitiness and elegance to the wines.

At the Mayer-Näkel estate in the Ahr, 80% of the winery’s production is red. Meike Näkel, who has spent time working in South Africa, explains: “we are very much in the north, but we have a very good microclimate. Our valley is narrow, the vineyards are very steep and south facing. In the narrow valley summer is hot compared to a region beside the valley. Our  soil is dark slate and stone, which warms up easily. The soils conserve heat and give it back to the vines at night-time.”

They export just 5% of production which Näkel says it is a new challenge. “My father started wine in 1982, at this time German red wine was not well known. Not many producers were making good red wine and this was the challenge for him. Now export is my new challenge. ”

Part of the challenge for quality-orientated producers of red wine is that most of the best are small players. They are often run by individual families who work hard in the vineyards and cellars to make good and exciting wines.  This of course means they only occasionally get abroad to promote their wines and build up a following. The onus is on wine connoisseurs sniffing out the best wines and spreading the word.