Mosel Masters or A Tale of Two Himmelreichs

12/13/23 -

Initially this was meant to be just a tale of the Middle Mosel Masters newly arrived on the shelves here at Chambers Street Wines. But then I thought it would be interesting to stretch the definition of the Middle Mosel up into the green reaches of the Lower Mosel literally across the border in the town of Alf in order to be able to compare two Himmelreich vineyards. We shall start farther southwest in the town of Neumagen and Piesporter (as seen in square 230 above) at the domaine of A J Adams. Brother and sister team Andreas and Barbara have basically retaken and revived their grandparents' winery that was abandoned by their parents in the 70s and 80s as so many others of that generation left the grueling steep vineyard work in favor of big town/city life. Yet, the vineyards of the Dhron Hofburg were famous in the 50s and 60s and graced the lists of the finest restaurants. The Dhron as seen in square 230 of the map above, is a side tributary emptying into the Mosel just south of Piesport at Neumagen. The valley and vineyards are extremely steep and cooler than those of the Mosel and reach higher altitudes. As Andreas tell it, the area was ripe for revitalization: “The sites were steep and very hard to work, so the land was very inexpensive. There was no demand because everyone had abandoned vineyards and Dhron didn’t have a famous name like Würtzgarten.” They also recently aquired a parcel in Piesport's Goldtropfchen vineyard skewing all blue slate as opposed to the Hofburg's grey, over 100 years old and completely ungrafted. Moving downriver just past the town of Bernkastel before the river's next bend at Zeltingen lies the town of Graach (square 232 above).

This is home to the wonderful world of Willi Schaefer who is absolutely, without question, one of the greatest producers in Germany. Records show that the Schaefers have been cultivating vineyards since 1590, but their vineyards were already classified as Grand Crus by the Romans and in the Prussian classification of the Mosel vineyards from 1816 to 1832, Graach’s vineyards had the highest ratings. Since 2015, Christoph Schaefer and his wife Andrea run this storied family winery in Graach. The pair met while studying enology at Geisenheim (as is often the case in Germany). Their winemaking philosophy is not much different than that of Christoph’s father or grandfather. The focus is not on numbers or analytics, but on how the grapes taste. As seen in the map above, Graacher Domprobst rises steeply directly above the village of Graach. Domprobst is an enclave of Graacher Himmelreich,  The deep topsoil, with plenty of clay, gives the wines from this site its distinctive more powerful character. It needs time to mature, in order to show off even more elegance and mineral finesse. Very often Domprobst wines are more wild, earthy and spicy than the ones from Himmelreich which mostly tend to be more silky and charming, with a fine fruity acidity and minerality. The aroma is often characterized by citrus and yellow and white peaches.

Moving farther Northeast down the Mosel, we arrive at the town of Enkirch just past Traben (as seen in the top right corner of box 232) and home to the famous Immich-Baterrieberg.

As I have already written an article about Immich Baterrieberg on April 5th in Middle Mosel Heroes, we will look specifically at their Erste Lage vineyard of Steffansberg that sits directly above the town of Enkirch facing due south. This 1er Cru is all red slate and  the bottling is sourced from the best grapes in the middle of the parcel where they ripen best (the rest go into the Detonation bottling) Fun fact: the vintage on the label color changes each year according to the energy of the vintage so 2022 is a hot orange! Continuing northward down the river, we cross the border technically from the Middle to the Lower or Terassenmosel which begins in the wine village of Pünderich (seen in green next to box 232 in top map) and ends at its confluence in the city of Koblenz where it empties into the Rhine. Just after Punderich, we arrive at the town of Alf where the large Elf on the Shelf Ulli Stein lives and works his vineyard magic. The irony is that the Lower Mosel vineyards are even higher in altitude and steeper than the Middle Mosel and hence offer great QPR wines since the real estate is cheaper as no one wants to work them!

We have written about Ulli Stein at length in Two Wines from Stein so we will just discuss his Himmelreich. Himmelreich ( aka Kingdom of Heaven in German) is on on the northern edge of the village. Consider this Stein’s “1er Cru” vineyard; though it’s a 1er Cru vineyard with 80+ year-old ungrafted vines and a serious terroir of mostly blue slate. This is the “other” Himmelreich and similar to its more famous sibling in Graach; the wines from this site always show a slimmer profile, a pronounced mineral fine-ness and lift. Naturally, I reccomend getting both Stein's and Schaefer's to do a side by side tasting!

Lastly, as we have already crossd over the border into the Lower Mosel or Terassenmosel, I'd be remiss if I didn't include Materne & Schmidt. hailing from the northernmost stretch of the Mosel before it empties out into the Rhine at Koblenz. Their base of Winningen (also home to Knebel and Lowenstein) is home to the Mosel's steepest and wildest vineyards. As I have written about the region and the producers in Heroes of the Terrassen Mosel's steepest vineyards, we will just look at Materne & Schmidt's single vineyard  Ausoniusstein. Named after a Roman poet who was the first to write about the Mosel whilst sitting up on top of this site, it's ironically  full of Mediterranean herbs and flowers with very old, small and aromatic grapes  This is always the most precise, firm, mineral and herbaceous of the three single vineyards and a rare treat to offer as the yields are microscopic and some years aren't enough to produce this single vineyard wine. As we wrap up our little odyssey down river, I can't recommend enough trying out at least 1 bottle from each producer to have a sense of change in latitude and terroir. Next week we will look at some Rhine Royalty new to our shelves. Until then, PROST!!! Giselle Hamburg