(Posted on WS 11 August)

This has been sitting in my in-laws' climate-controlled storage room (a constant 15C) since they got it as a present in 1976.

It came with them on the train when they visited, so we put it in the refrigerator to cool down (it's hot here guys, and they don't have AC anywhere) and then opened it. The cork was soft and a fifth of the cork broke off but we got it out without dropping any cork into the bottle.

As soon as the cork was out, the wine let out a fruity orange-blossom and honey scent, indicating that it was not over the hill. In the glass, it was amber colored (similar to Lipton Iced Tea, actually, or a mature beerenauslese). It left long and lingering but skinny legs on the side of the glass and continued to emit the orange-blossom, honey and citrus scent.

Flavor wise, the first thing you taste is the zinging acidity - like lighlty sweetened lemon juice, followed a second later by sweet citrus fruits and hints of apricot. We drank a little icewine in comparison - unlike the auslese, the icewein was sticky and sweet-tart. This wine, in comparison, had perfect balance. Slight hints of gasoline, but nothing overpowering.

In the mid palatte it had a thin mouthfeel and was a bit hollow compared to what it showed up front - perhaps that's where the age was showing. However, the strong finish of orange blossoms and apricots lingered as long as any Riesling I have had.

I would give it an 87.

I have no idea what food I would drink this with - we drank it as an aspertif. I also do not know anything about Richard Hass, which the label says is based in Winzenheim in the Nahe. I found that odd, because the Nussdorfer Bischofskreuz is in Landau in the Pfalz (the label also said the wine was from the "Rhein Pflaz" which I assume is a quaint name for the Pfalz). In any case, no winery meeting such description can be found on the internet, so perhaps Richard Haas no longer exists.