I was struck dumb by the author's statement that he assumed the Rieslings would be dry. Rieslings make some of the most luscious dessert wines. Especially those from the middle Mosel and the Rheingau. They also make lovely dry wines, from steely too stony. It is true that the bulk of American rieslings are not dry, but the good ones are balanced and clean up after themselves when you swallow them, so they tend to finish similar to a dry wine.
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As an aside, it's worth mentioning that some fantastic Rieslings are made on the other side of the Rhine from Alsace, in Baden and in Württemberg. Maybe it's climate change, maybe the industry has re-oriented itself, but there are many hidden treasures in southwest Germany.
Just so that I'm halfway on topic, many/most of them are dry.
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@ Alaric Germany
Perhaps for a resident of Germany, Alsace is "on the other side of the Rhine". A geographically more accurate designation is on the left and right bank of the Rhine. (In German, linksrheinisches bzw. rechtsrheinisches Ufer).
I beg to differ with your equating the Alsacian Rieslings to those of Baden and Württemberg. The former ones are, in my view, much superior.
@Tuvw Xyz
Riesling in Baden is a niche business. It´s popular only in Bergstraße and particularly in Ortenau. Other parts of Baden are rooting out Riesling actually because it´s not the right grape in times of climate change there.
Baden and Alsace have other philosophies in winegrowing. Baden is more aligned to modern German "Wine miracle" principles applied also on Baden. In the 80ties and 90ties Alsace wines were very succesful here. Their quality was considered better than German wines as it truly had been in these times and so - due to the cutback of protection by EU - they had big markets shares in Germany on the cost of German producers.
All gone. When German vintners had to catch up with quality just to survive in the 90ties they passed them by from 2000 on. Markets made a harsh decision then.
Managers of specialist dealers and quality co-ops in Baden region I know personnaly also agree unambigously: Alsace is stuck in the 90ties ("Dii im Elsaß sin stehe gebliibe!")
So Riesling doesn´t fit in the quality categories of "New Baden" anymore under conditions of climate change.
No wonder when even in Rheingau 100 km many producers are concerned. They fear not without reason that even there it´s getting too hot for "our poor Riesling".
https://www.rhein-zeitung.de/region_artikel,-klimawandel-gefahr-fuer-lei...
For reds it doesn´t matter. Baden and Alsace are both inspired by Bourgogne and are advancing rapidly.
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In the chemical sense , "dry" means converting all the sugar to alcohol. Therefore, to say, 'off-dry' is to speak nonsense--as if you were to say, 'kind of pregnant'.
On the other hand, commercialized language(s) offer us dry-ness as a matter of perception. Indeed, if the acid level is high enough, residual sugars cannot be perceived. This you can verify at home with sugary water and gradually-added lemon juice.
Riesling--because of its high level of acidity--is normally described in commercial terms. Moreover, a chemically- dry Riesling is somewhat unpalatable for many; a touch of 'r/s' is needed to temper down the bitterness.
A touch of sugar is also necessary to bring out the oily, anyl-based esters that suggest apricot and fusil oils (not diesel!). This is true of Gewurztraminer as well, btw, with its linoleic compounds that suggest lychee.
Yet Alsatian Rieslings do not have this problem. Rather, their warmer growing season ensures far less acidity at the pick--therefore no need to 'balance' with r/s. Of course, the counter-argument goes that Riesling at the Alsatian level of ripeness is far beyond that which will give the 'varietal character' that makes 'riesling', Riesling.
Lastly, winemakers select an r/s-acid level which best suits their own notion of 'balance'. To this end, all labeling descriptors are somewhat misleading. German house styles, ostensibly imitated by Americans, are just as real to Riesling connoisseurs as, say, Napa Cabs and Bordeaux...
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Why must you call Washington "Washington State?" Are you genuinely concerned that folks might be thinking that a wine originates in D.C.?
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I am way late to riesling, and now it has pretty much become my go-to white, even for my casual wine drinking approach.
No doubt, some experts will wince at at my my endorsement as I am not any kind of expert, just mostly a glass or two a day type enthusiast. But boy have I grown tired of all the usual popular whites of the last few decades. Riesling is such a nice change from these! The scale that a previous poster provided was very useful for a newbie like me.
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I think it shows how food can vary a wine's profile. I think it may be wise to try the wine with another dish that doesn't have sweet tendencies . . . plus riesling is amazing due to it being both high in acidity and high in sugar at harvest, think the German Spätlese Trocken wines.
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I'm a bit put off that Eric's recommending wines and writing entire articles about them without having tried them.
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@Tim
I was thinking the same thing. Also, isn't a dry Riesling that "never tasted so sweet" an oxymoron?
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@Tim
Agreed. I was stopped by Eric’s statement: “I had recommended three bottles, as I do each month in Wine School, and I had presumed that they would all be dry.” It May be that he had tried them all and found that not all bottles tasted the same when opened ... but perhaps that’s a “too generous” interpretation of his article. I’ll keep reading these articles but some clarification from the author might be in order.
In Europe these terms are regulated by EU.
According to EU regulation 753/2002 the following terms may be used on the labels:
Dry: Sweetness up to 4 g/l
("Trocken")
If balanced with suitable acidity: Sweetness up to 9 g/l
(nicknamed "Deutsch trocken" here, because many
dry German Rieslings are this way.)
Medium dry: Sweetness up to 12 g/l
If balanced with suitable acidity: up to 18 g/l
("halbtrocken")
Medium: up to 45 g/l
This is unusual for Riesling. Many producers prefer
the not regulated but proven term "feinherb" within a
range from 18 g/l to 25-27 g/l (This can be great,
particularly when they are heavy on acidity like many
Mosel and Saar Rieslings!)
Sweet: more than 45 g/l
For Riesling the label "Sweet" is unusual. Rieslings not
labeled as "dry", "medium dry" or "feinherb" are assumed
to be "sweet" also named as "lieblich" or "fruchtig" just to
avoid labeling them as "sweet".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweetness_of_wine
Maybe this framework can provide a first guide in US also.
Many vintners are giving basic datas in their lists but it turned out that this basic information is not as meaningful as expected. It´s helpful to a certain extent nevertheless.
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@ws
The author's point--somewhat obliquely stated--was that EU regulations fail to describe 'sweetness' as human perception. A second factor is missing in describing taste from the perspective of the taster: the level of acidity.
Moreover, EU regulations mutilate the basics of chemistry for the sake of misleading customers. That's because, to the oenologist, 'dry' has always designated a complete ferment of all sugars to ethyl.
Yet oenologiists qua botanists also know that grapes lose acidity as they ripen. Therefore, the riper the grape, the lesser the acidity against which to balance it off.
So all you can say is that at 3.99g/l of r/s, EU declares the wine 'dry' in absence of any information regarding the level of acidity which would legislate the taste itself.
This is pure nonsense.
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@bill harris
That´s why I wrote: "... that this basic information is not as meaningful as expected."
Four examples - not American so it´s OT - but it might help the wine drinker.
1. Alsatian Rieslings (left side of the Rhine) like Baden Rieslings from Ortenau (right side) are traditionally very ripe and low on acid - a reason many German Riesling afficionados call them "no true Rieslings". You either like it or you don´t. In good years all these wines taste dry and balanced even when acid is significantly under 3 g/l.
2. 2015 was very high in acid in Germany but there is no unpleasant impression of acidity in most of dry wines because biting malic acid was extremely low. The high amounts of the "smooth" tartaric acid could be easily balanced by 6-7 g/l.
3.The best "feinherb Riesling Spätlese" in 2016 - a vintage extremely low on acid - of one of my most favoured vintners had 12 g/l It complies to the legal definition of "unbalanced half dry" but it gives a perfect impression of "feinherb" nevertheless due to low acidity and ripeness without botrytis. In 2017 his "feinherb Riesling Spätlese" from the same vineyard had to have 28 g/l to give a similar impression of "feinherb" - the vintage character is completely different nevertheless.
4. In 2016 a Mosel Spätlese with 45 g/l tasted "too sweet" while those of 2015 and 2017 from the same yineyard were just right with 70 g/l or 80 g/l (2017) because of different acidity structures and ripeness of these three vintages.
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@ws
When you have two factors that determine an outcome of perceived taste --in this case, sugar and acid--yet reference only one (sugar), you are speaking nonsense. In other words, no, it's not "as meaningful as expected"; rather, meaningless.
Alsatian Rieslings are not different because they come from the west bank of the Rhine. Rather, being southwards of the Mosel, the climate is warmer.
Here, the French have committed The Amerikanoid Fallacy that they've otherwise tried so hard to stop: in terms of their own application of their own INAO rules, varietals have only one target taste that's associated with a given degree of ripeness. By this standard, no, Alsatian Rieslings only occasionally demonstrate varietal character.
Otherwise, your copious tasting notes appear tho support the general point that acids count. Yet, curiously, you persist in using the bolderized
lexicon that the EU has provided. This is exactly my criticism of the author: neither of you seem to notice the Humpty-Dumpty-ness of your 'sort- of- kind- of- dryish' enslavement to EU daffynitional doublespeak. Curious
Lastly, Tartaric acid is lemony, btw...
There are a variety of organic compounds other than sugars that impart a sweet taste, artificial sweeteners for example. Perhaps something like this might be produced during the fermentation or aging process. Certain whiskies have a hint of sweetness that would have to be from some type of volatile compound other than simple sugars.
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@ Ohio MD Westlake, OH
It may be that the variation in sweetness is a simple result of the US vintners denaturing Riesling. E.g., real Riesling should be dry, as in Alsace. Sweeter varieties, such as those produced in the Mosel Valley of Germany (Spätlese, Auslese), go with other foods, but they are good substitutes for such dessert wines as Montbazillac and Sauternes.
@Tuvw Xyz
I once spent several months touring Europe's wine regions and tasting half a dozen wines a day. I loved the Mosel river wines and to categorize them as either Spätlese or Auslese is really inaccurate. One pays more for them, but there are surely more Kabinett wines produced along the Mosel than Spätlese an Auslese. Stands to reason as these labels indicate when in the season the grapes were picked and I don't believe that the majority of winemakers risk leaving all their grapes for late picking.
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