Drink a Mosel Riesling before you die! Why?
This is the original low alcohol wine. But, unlike many modern constructions, Mosel Riesling is layered, complex and age worthy.
Great wines are often a contradiction. And, Mosel Riesling is no exception. Beautiful, delicate, and dainty yet intense, concentrated, and serious. These wines are light bodied, low in alcohol (8 or 9% being typical), and very refreshing yet dense, layered, and age worthy. Intensely fragrant, Mosel Rieslings tend to be more floral than most and have a lovely limpidity that can be utterly beguiling. Absolutely delicious.
Equally as mesmerizing are the vineyards that produce these wines. Growing along the seriously steep valleys of the meandering Mosel River and its tributaries Saar and Ruwer. These vineyards are amongst the steepest in the world. In fact, the vineyard Bremmer Calmont is the steepest in the world with an incline of 65 degrees.
Unlike most grapevines in Europe (indeed, the World), those of the Mosel are ungrafted. Not even the vine destroying aphid, phylloxera, could get established in these harsh conditions. The steepness of the slopes means there’s a distinct lack of topsoil (something the phylloxera apparently needs). The surface of many vineyards is just broken slate with vines individually staked into the ground.
For the back breaking effort that goes into producing a bottle of Mosel Riesling and level of quality these bottles contain the wine is an absolute bargain. Jancis Robinson MW suggests these are the most labour-intensive vineyards in the world and need seven times the man-hours that a flat vineyard requires. Something to think about, and be grateful for, next time sipping a cool glass of Mosel Riesling.