$32.50 Cdn
8.5% alcohol
Light straw yellow in color.
Green apple and lime dominate the nose with hints of floral, pineapple and honey.
Citrus Green Apple explodes in the mouth with pleasant fruity-floral mid-palate. This wine has a very long finish with green apple/pineapple with hint of honey.

This Middle Mosel wine is a delicate effort that is a little citrus'y right out of the bottle, but does smooth out after an hour or so.
I'm not sure how much life this wine would have in the cellar, or how much it will improve with age.

This wine is a winner.

I haven't had this one, but I've had the JJ Prum five times and it's spectacular.

At the Institute of Masters of Wine (North America) Ltd.'s Germany's Ultimate Terroir Wine Tasting in the Presidio, San Francisco, they had the Kabinett of the WS and the Brauneberger Juffer spatlese. I gave the former a + and the latter ++, both very high ratings. Out of 89 wines I only gave one +++, 7 ++ and 7 +'s. Of course, half of the wines were trocken's or halb trocken's and even though many were from very respected estates, I'm just not a fan of the dry rieslings. The only wine that I gave a +++ is the Monchhof Urziger Wurzgarten spatlese which is not only a great wine, it is reasonable ($18.95).

Board-O, everyone seems to rave about the J.J. Prum WS spatlese and auslese. This has been my favorite wine for some time before the 2001's came out. Still love the wine, but this is a wine that seldom shows well young in a great year.

Well, it's showing exceptional well young now. If you have any, I'd suggest trying one. This is so special, that my remaining six bottles might not see the new year.

I'll agree completely with your sentiments on the dry Rieslings. Why bother? this is a grape that produces such special sweet wines and rather ordinary dry ones, that I stick to the sweet. In fact, other than the 2001 vintage, I usually stick to BAs, TBAs, and Eisweins only.

Interesting comments GATC.

Riesling is a fairly new wine experience for me/us. It was when exploring Alsatian wines that I really discovered how much I liked it.
I brought home a bottle of '00 Albert Mann Grand Cru Furstentum Riesling one night and both my wife and I got truly intrigued (and my wife really didn't drink wine much). Since then we have been buying German Rieslings to try.

To be fair, we have yet to experience Auslesen, Beerenauslese, or the trockenbeerenauslese wines.

We started at the base with QbA wines, and presently into the QmP wines with Kabinett, Spatlese...and a Auslese to be opened soon ('99 Zeltinger Sonnenuhr Auslese by Selbach-Oster).

I tend to still prefer the Alsatian Rieslings so far, but Lady Tyee definitely likes German more (and we all know who will win...).

Availability of QmP Rieslings above Auslese are hard to find here other than a few Eisweins, so I'm not sure how far up the ladder we'll get to experience.

For now we're enjoying the exploration ride.

I visited Max Ferd. Richter last week. I don't know who distributes their wines, but they are definitely an old time high quality producer. Horst Max Ferd. Richter hosted my wife and I since their 2 normal hosts were in Hamburg for a big wine show. He was a true gentleman and their family history is fascinating. I'm definitely impressed with their wines. Unfortunately, ALL 2001's (kabinett on up) were sold out at the winery. I bought 2 halbtrockens and a 98 Auslese**.

GATC

You lucky Dog!

I found a link (website) for MF Richter:
web page

A family owned estate for 300 years!

Great looking estate!

<sigh> maybe some day I'll be as lucky.

Btw, GATC I've heard on the Squires board that 2002 was supposed to be another good year in Germany. You going to stock up again?

Skwid, I've heard interesting things about 2002. At the Dr. Loosen estate, the guide said that it rained after they picked the spatlesen so auslesen and up are ruined. But since they left the fruit hanging, they got a lot of eiswein. Stealthman's notes on what Ernst Loosen said in SF is somewhat consistent although he included auslese. They have a lot of vineyards, so these comments are not inconsistent. I've read that Rheingau, Pfalz and Saar (believe it or not since it is the coldest and rainiest area) are supposed to be good. No one raved about the Mosel for 2002. For 2001 the middle Mosel (my favorite area by far) is simply great. I'm sure that at least 2/3rd of my 42+ cases are middle Mosel.

My wife and I both caught the comment that they have not seen much snow in the past 5-10 years. It appears that the area has been warmer overall and this could explain a nice string of vintages through the 90's and for 01. 00 is still considered subpar, but not nearly as bad as the bad vintages in the 70's and 80's. Could be the effect of global warming (a hotly debated topic), but there is no doubt that the wines are better lately.

500 bottles at 1/week is still only 10 years worth and half of what I bought should be drunk after 10 years, so I do need to buy more in the next 10 years.

Tyee, the tasting room at Max Ferd. Richter is like getting into the time machine and going back 100+ years. Since there are so few places that you can visit and taste, it was a real treat. I still remember what Horst Max Ferd. Richter said as my wife and I smiled looking at all of the pictures. All of the family going back all those years look the same (like in the movies when they take one person and just dress them up differently). He said "same face" and we just cracked up.