Pale straw, green hints, star bright. Low plus nose of smoke, slate, green apple and lemon. Medium minus body, medium intensity, medium-to-medium plus acidity. More smoke, citrus, and slate. Seemingly Kabinett level, very tight. 89pts.??

Had the auslese last night with the Christoffels, S-O Bernkasteller Badstube and THE Darting (Durkheimer Nonnengarten rieslaner auslese). The Prum lover in the group loved it, but I thought that it was easily outclassed by the rest. Somehow there is a Prum characteristic that annoys me - the best I can describe is lychee. To me, Prum makes a good wine but it never has the purity and elegance of a good middle Mosel.

We must disagree on that, GATC. I love Prum's wines. My initiation to them was the 1976 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Beerenauslese, which I had about a half dozen times. I'm glad to hear you liked the Darting.

J. J. prum makes some of hte most "true to type" wines in the Mosel. With the run up in ripeness that has occured in 1999-2004 the Prum "pradikat-typical" wines get classed as light or a step below wines from other producers. What is going to happen is that in 20-30 years time the Prum wines will be showing as truly great examples of their type (a '75 Sonnenuhr Auslese that I had recently was simply gorgeous).

Recent vintages have truly clouded the picture of German Riesling, much to the detriment of great, classic producers like Prum and Grunhaus. They have not kept up with the bigger is better school. All I can say is thanks for that.

For what it's worth, the 2003 Sonnenuhr Spatlese came from what were easily auslese sugar level grapes.

Count me in as a Prum fan. A magical bottle of 1976 W-S Auslese cast a spell over me one night in NYC.

Let me clarify. I used to be a huge Prum fan for a long long time and I still like them. I just don't like them as much as Christoffel. Once I started drinking Christoffel, they dominated my riesling purchases. What I really like about them is that they are great the first day, and good the 2nd and 3rd day. I find Prum's to be really erratic ranging from great to strange.

I was actually mostly responding to Jason. I found it odd for a Prum spatlese to be characterized as kabinett level.

I think the bottle had one of two things going on. It was either far too young and clamped down tight or a slightly off bottle. Something never sat right with me the whole time I was drinking it. I too found it very strange for it to show like a Kabinett especially in 2003.

I don't know how long it was open, but I tend to decant young Prum for up to 24 hours. It needs it. I did that with the 2003 Bernkasteler Badstube Auslese & it worked wonders. In fact it worked so well that the wife asked me to buy more!

After work wine with no time to decant. I too usually decant and or only drink half the bottle to see it the next day too.

Glad to hear that you do this. That is why I like to drink a bottle of riesling over 2-3 days. I open a bottle, try a glass right away, then try another glass over the next hour or so. Then I cork it and put it in the bar refrigerator to try the next day or two. I really enjoy seeing how the wine evolves. I have found that the lesser quality wines do not hold up well with this method.