make your own bordeaux wine

Sommelier INDIA
For Indians around the world who enjoy
wine and the good life
Volume 11, Issue 2, April-May 2016 `200
THE WINE MAGAZINE
MAKE YOUR OWN
BORDEAUX WINE SURESH BHALLA DID
SO CAN YOU page 17
The Judgement
of Paris
REVISITING THE FAMOUS
TASTING page 56
Gem of a grape
EMBRACING CHENIN BLANC
page 48
Biodynamics
A WORLDWIDE
TREND THAT HAS
CAUGHT ON page 72
INDIA’S PREMIER WINE MAGAZINE. FOR RESTRIC TED CIRCULATION ONLY
WINEEVENT
Toast
to the
Capital
Rieslingfeier Delhi 2016 was a rare experience
for Delhi’s wine lovers, with five top producers
of German Rieslings presenting their
exceptional wines at a wine dinner in the
capital. By Rajiv Kehr
T
he English translation of the
German word feier is celebration
or party. Hotel Leela, Gurgaon,
with the support of Lufthansa
and the German Wine
Institute recently played host to the very first
Riesling Festival in India, celebrating German
Riesling, the acknowledged king of German
wines and one of the six noble grape varieties.
Riesling is considered by many to be among
the finest white wine grapes in the world, a
view shared by Jancis Robinson MW, wine
writer for the Financial Times of London and
Sommelier India columnist.
Some of us may have first noticed Riesling
as one of the more affordable white wines on
hotel wine lists. And the very first glass of
German wine for wine enthusiasts belonging
24 Sommelier INDIA
APRIL-MAY 2016
Toasting German
Rieslings and the
great winemakers
who came to Delhi
with their wines to
participate in the
Riesling Festival
APRIL-MAY 2016
Sommelier INDIA 25
to my generation, may well have been
Liebfraumilch by Blue Nun, a very popular
brand at the time, targeting the international
mass market.
So, was an introduction to German wine
via the semi-sweet Liebfraumilch or Blue Nun
such a bad thing? Not really. We all have to start
somewhere. How can one appreciate greatness
if you have not known and experienced wines
at both ends of the spectrum? Many people
might only think of Riesling as the cheap wine
on a hotel list, but there is another world of
“haute couture” Rieslings that attract the most
frenzied bids at an auction.
These collectible bottles fetch record prices.
The 2003 Trockenbeerenauslese (TBA) from
Egon Müller, for instance, was auctioned at the
annual Trier Mosel Wine Auction in 2015 for
€12,000, making it the most expensive bottle
of white wine ever, while a double magnum
(three-litre bottle) of G Max 2009 from
Weingut Keller was bought for a record €4,000
in 2010, which was the highest price ever paid
in auction for a young dry Riesling, according
to Hans Jürgen Podzun, head of the Koblenz
Chamber of Commerce.
Numerous records prove that at one time
Riesling commanded prices as great as the top
First Growths from Bordeaux and was highly
regarded. The wine served at Queen Elizabeth’s
coronation in 1952 was a Riesling from Nierstein,
Hipping, one of the prime plots owned by Klaus
Peter. Indeed, in many instances, Riesling was
the preferred choice of wine at official dinners.
Wineries like Robert Weil in Rheingau display
old menus with Rieslings on the list for State
Dinners in Europe.
S
o what happened? How did Riesling lose
its way? In the 1980s producers lost focus
and began to produce more and more
wine for the mass market, diluting the great
ability of Riesling to faithfully express its terroir,
which is precisely what a wine connoisseur seeks
in a top bottle. For without emotion there can
be no great bottle, nor can there be appreciation
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APRIL-MAY 2016
Rajiv Kehr and
the “Wine Queen
of Rheinhessen”
flanked by Tridib
Sarkar and Parag
Tripathi
of its worth. Its twin peaks are intense perfume
and a piercing crisp acidity, which it manages
to retain even at extremely ripe levels. Riesling
produces delicate, racy, nervy and stylish wines
that cover a wide spectrum of flavours – from
steely and bone dry, with beautifully scented
notes of apples, apricots, and sometimes peaches,
to exotically sweet flavours of the great sweet
wines. The wines are technically correct, but how
does one convey the emotion you experience at
the sight and smell of an aged BA or TBA , a
wine that has been transformed over time, by
the hand of nature from a pale greenish, golden
hue to a rich brown colour that can shimmer and
dance in the candlelight. Thanks to its aromatic
profile and acidity, Riesling makes for a perfect
pairing with spicy Asian cuisine including
Indian food. I very much wanted wine lovers in
India to experience the rich diversity of styles
that the best bottlings, from the top producers,
have to offer. From this an idea was born which
eventually blossomed into a Riesling festival,
with five producers representing Rheingau,
Mosel and Mosel Saar showcasing their wines.
Theresa Breuer of Georg Breuer, which has
been specialising in dry Rieslings from their
great terroir since 1980, was enthusiastic about
coming to India even though she produces a
minuscule 6,000 bottles of her Rüdesheim
Berg Schlossberg. Rheingau proudly lays claim
to the fact that Spätlese (late harvest) wines
first originated there. Producers like Theresa
today see Rheingau as the home of some of the
best dry Riesling.
I met with a similar response from
Barbara Engerer of Weingüter Geheimrat J
Wegeler. Wegeler, with holdings in some of
the best plots in Rheingau and Mosel, were
perfect examples of house style over terroir.
In 1992, Wegeler formed a team together with
the estates of Breuer, Hans Lang and Robert
Weil that pioneered the introduction of Erste
Gewächse (comparable to France’s Grand
Cru designation) to the market in a concerted
effort to re-establish the character of a site as
the sole criterion of quality.
Next to sign up, were Klaus Peter and
Julia Keller from Rheinhessen. Klaus Peter’s
wines fetch record prices and critical acclaim
is deservedly heaped upon them by scores of
wine writers and critics. In 2012 they had the
honour of supplying the wine for the 60th
Anniversary of the coronation of Queen
Elizabeth II. In 2013 they produced the baby
wine for little Prince George from the steep
From top to bottom: A selection of snapshots of top German winemakers
and guests at the dinner held at the Hotel Leela Gurgaon for Rieslingfeir Delhi
2016, the first Riesling Festival staged in India and curated by Rajiv Kehr
APRIL-MAY 2016
Sommelier INDIA 27
Hipping vineyard in Nierstein.
Lovers of Indian food, Klaus Peter and
Julia reached deep into their cellar to present
an auction bottle from Nierstein, the famous
wine-growing town in Rheinhessen, along with
their Westhofen, Abts E, Grosses Gewächs,
2007. We were already on a roll.
The Mosel which is the quintessential
Riesling region for many was represented by
Nik Weis of St Urbans-Hof. Mosel Rieslings
are bright, fruity and fresh with acidity
and sugar to give them an ageing potential,
second to none. Weingut St Urbans-Hof was
first established in 1947 by Nicolaus Weis
who was awarded the prestigious title of
“Oekonomierat” (Chancellor of Agriculture)
in 1969 for his dedication to German
viticultural traditions and his name and title
became part of the winery name, “St UrbansHof Oekonomierat Nic”.
All that remained now was to sign up Egon
Müller whose Scharzhofberg vineyard is one of
the finest in Germany. So great is its fame, that
it remains one of only a handful of German
vineyards whose wines are sold without
mention of the village name. The vineyard
was most likely planted by the Romans and
belonged to the monastery of “St Marien ad
Martyres” in Trier from its founding around
700 through the Middle Ages.
After the French Revolution and the
occupation of the West Bank of the Rhine
by the revolutionary government, all church
properties were seized and sold. Egon Müller’s
great great-grandfather acquired the Scharzhof
estate in 1797 from the “Republique Française”.
It has remained in the family ever since.
Egon Müller owns about 21 acres of prime
vineyards in the Scharzhofberg and manages
the small estate of Le Gallais in the Wiltinger
Braune Kupp of 10 acres. About eight acres of
ungrafted Riesling vines in the Scharzhofberg
date back to the last century, planted at a
density of 4,000 vines per acre. Insecticides
have not been used for 25 years. There is no
treatment against Botrytis.
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APRIL-MAY 2016
W
“I very much
wanted wine
lovers in India
to experience
the rich
diversity of
styles that the
best bottlings
from the top
producers have
to offer”
e were now set to organise
the festival on January 27,
showcasing a broad range of the
greatest wines from Germany at a dinner with
the support of the German Wine Institute
who sent along Sabrina Becker, Rheinhessen
Wein Konigin (Wine Queen of Rheinhessen)
2015/2016, to represent all the wine regions
in Germany. The chefs at Diya, the Indian
restaurant at the Leela, rose to the occasion
by coming up with an Indian menu to pair
with the wines over several flights.
Now that it’s all over, I sometimes
wonder how it happened. After all, per capita
consumption of wine in India according to
the latest statistics published by the German
Wine Institute is a mere 0.01 litre. Another
way to look at that statistic is the fact that the
total consumption of wine in India is 15,000
kl and in the tiny state of Singapore it’s 17,300
kl. In comparison, India ranks 50th globally
in consumption of beer.
Indian weddings are extravagant affairs
with no expense spared and the choicest
of whiskies served to the guests, while the
selection of wine leaves much to be desired.
However, once more people experience the
emotion and the pleasure of a great bottle of
wine, I am sure this will change.
It comes as no surprise, then, that
dedicated wine professionals from across the
hospitality industry were silenced for a time
when they first experienced the indescribable
emotion of tasting a TBA from Egon Müller
at the Master Class organised at the Leela
Gurgaon by the amiable Dutch-Australian
General Manager, Michel Koopman, who is a
greatr supporter of such programmes.
In time, I have no doubt that India will
take its rightful place, globally, as a good
market for high-end wine. I don’t see it as
a distant dream, especially when many of
the greatest winemakers such as those who
participated in the Festival are willing to lend
their support to nurture the Indian market. I
salute them for their vision! ❖
WINESOFGERMANY
RENOWNED
RIESLINGS
Gurjit Barry’s firsthand account of an
exclusive Master Class presented by
some of the top winemakers in Germany
J
anuary 29, 2016 will go down in the
diaries of a few chosen wine lovers in the
city as a most memorable day. This was
the day when the rarest of the rare Rieslings
from Germany were presented to a select
audience at a Master Class held at the Leela
Gurgaon hotel by accomplished international
winemakers, whose names we usually get to
see only in wine magazines (such as this) with
people like Egon Müller, Nik Weis, Julia and
Klaus Peter Keller, Theresa Breuer, Barbara
Engerer and Sabrina Becker, the beautiful
Wine Queen of Rheinhessen.
It is no mean feat to get hold of the top guns
of the German wine world together in a room
with knowledge-thirsty wine lovers in India.
And we are indebted to Rajiv Kher, a highly
respected wine collector, connoisseur and
curator of fine wine dinners, for making the
event possible. We tasted various expressions
of the Riesling grape that day. Riesling has
always been known as one of the most
versatile of grapes. In Germany, it accounts
for almost one-fifth of the plantings and is
capable of making both still and sparkling
wines in bone dry as well as semi dry
avatars, semi sweet to lusciously sweet,
along with the spectacularly delicious
and rare, ice-wines. It would not be
wrong to call it the “Queen of Grapes”. A
cold climate lover with remarkably high
acidity, Riesling needs extra days of sun
to reach its full ripeness. It does well even in
rocky soil and, when young, produces wines
with aromas of rose, cashew, peach and green
apples. Capable of producing age-worthy
wines, Rieslings acquire complexity with age
and are a treat for the palate.
Given below is a list of the wines
presented at the Master Class. Because
of space constraints, instead of providing
individual tasting notes I describe the house
and the wine styles in general. Five prestigious
houses present – Georg Breuer, Wegeler, Egon
Müller, St Urbans-Hof and Keller. Each house
represented and showcased a style different
from the other, yet each is steeped in history
and tradition.
GEORG BREUER
Wine from Wegeler
Estates, one of the
best known vineyards
in the mid Mosel
region
The wines of Georg Breuer impressed
everyone with their elegance. Founded in
1880, the estate specialises in producing dry,
age-worthy Rieslings where quality dictates
each decision. Unlike the new generation of
winemakers, the Georg Breuer winery prides
itself in using no high tech equipment. So it
all boils down to the skill of the winemaker
and decades of experience. Lengthy storage
on fine yeast and micro-oxygenation help
develop the wines and impart longevity.
■ 2011 Berg Rottland
■ 2013 Rudesheimer Berg Schlossberg
■ 2014 Terra Montosa
WEGELER
The wines of Wegeler were another gem
that we discovered that day. Wegeler’s
winemaking history dates back to more
than 130 years and the wines have been
hailed around the world by leading wine
experts. In 1900, brothers Julius and Carl
Wegeler acquired shares of the Bernkastler
“Doctor” site and paid 35.8 grams of gold
per square metre. This transaction goes
down in German history as the highest
anyone has ever paid till now for a vineyard.
It was a purchase that made it possible for
APRIL-MAY 2016
Sommelier INDIA 29
the winery to make high quality wine for
discerning consumers over generations.
■ 2013 Geheimrat J Riesling Spätlese Trocken
■ 2002 Oestricher Lenchen Spätlese
■ 2014 Sonnenuhr Riesling Spätlese
■ 2014 Rudesheim Berg Schlossberg Kabinett
KELLER
The cracking-good wines of Keller had us
all in awe. We were served a Kabinett and
another GG, short for Grosses Gewächs. Jancis
Robinson considers Keller wines equivalent
to Montrachets and on the other side of the
Atlantic, Robert Parker names Klaus Peter
Keller as the godfather of Riesling.
■ 2012 Nierstein P Kabinett Versteigerung
(Rare Auction Wine)
■ 2007 Abts E Riesling GG
ST URBANS-HOF
This winery is already represented in India by
Mumbai-based wine importer, Vishal Kadakia,
proprietor of The Wine Park. However, it
was the first time that I met Nikolaus Peter
Weis, or Nik Weis as his friends address him.
Nik is the third generation owner and estate
manager as well as the winemaker at Weingut
St Urbans-Hof. The estate totals 35 hectares
and is the single largest privately owned estate
in the Mosel-Saar-Ruwer region of Germany.
Under Nik’s guidance St Urbans-Hof has
been established and recognised as a leader in
quality wine production.
■ 2007 Leiwener Laurentiuslay Riesling
Spätlese St Urbans-Hof
■ 2012 Piesporter Goldtröpfchen Riesling
Kabinett St Urbans-Hof
■ 2011 Laurentiuslay Riesling Spätlese St
Urbans-Hof
■ 2010 SAARFEISSER Trockenbeerenauslese
St Urbans-Hof
EGON MÜLLER
The highly respected Müller Family has
owned and produced wine at their Scharzhof
Estate since 1797. Two centuries later, fourth
30 Sommelier INDIA
APRIL-MAY 2016
Top: Impressive line-up
of German Rieslings.
Above: Label of
Weingut von Hovel
Scharzhofberger
Riesling Kabinett, one
of the more soughtafter wines from the
Mosel. Below: Two
fine examples from St
Urbans-Hof winery,
run by third generation
owner and winemaker,
Nik Weis
generation winemaker, Egon Müller carries
on the family tradition. It is worth mentioning
that Egon Müller belongs to Primum Familiae
Vini (PVF), a small group of elite, familyowned wine producers. Müller is the only
German member of this illustrious group.
The Müller promise of quality is such that no
wine below Kabinett level is allowed to bear
the vineyard name.
Egon Müller owns 8.3 hectares of ungrafted
Riesling vines going back to the last century on
the Scharzhofberg estate, out of a total of 28
hectares available. Scharzhofberg is considered
one of the most prestigious sites in Germany.
The estate produces BA, TBA and even
Eiswein. The TBA wines of Egon Müller are so
rare that they can only be bought at auctions.
Müller shared a bottle of 1995 Scharzhofberger
Trockenbeerenauslese (TBA) Egon Müller with
us. The auction price of this wine is around
€11,000 per bottle of 75 cl.
■ 2011 Scharzhofberger Kabinett
■ 1995 Scharzhofberger Trockenbeerenauslese
I can confidently say that all the wines made
a lasting impression. This was no ordinary
Riesling tasting. The wines swept us all off our
feet by their simplicity, intensity and depth of
flavour. As I write this piece while sipping a
German Riesling on a nippy January evening,
all I can hope for is that these wines are made
available in India soon, so that more wine lovers
can enjoy Germany’s excellent Rieslings. ❖