Schloss Vollrads, 'Volratz 1573' Rheingau Riesling Trocken

If you like Riesling at all, you'll absolutely love this!

In fact, if you like wine at all, this is well-worth a look...

Complete with a beautiful bottle shape and a stunning, old-fashioned painting label, this is all about tradition and traditions. Made from a blend of different Riesling vineyards in the Rheingau, this wine is full of aromatic white fruit, peach and apples with gorgeous, lively fresh acidity that delivers a long and tasty finish. 

Delicious and dry, complex and classic. Yes please.

Schloss Vollrads is one of the world's most-respected and oldest wineries, having continuously made wine since at least 1211. As you'd expect, a winery that's been around for so long, which has lasted through so much history, has also been part of many of the developments in wine production as a whole. Indeed, they were at the helm of the creation of the German Prädikat system (yeah, thanks) and as such produced the first ever Kabinett in 1716.

Still ploughing those furrows, this wine is interesting as it is a homage to the era before the Prädikat system was in place. The picture of the label is the oldest known depiction of the Schloss Vollrads and its vineyard (historically called "Volratz") from a map of the area, made in 1573. Lovely!

Since the 2022 vintage, the estate has encouragingly moved to 100% certified organic production. Modernising an 800-year-old winery is not easily done, but the intentions are clear - they plan for a new, gravity-fed fermentation system with any power requirements delivered by renewable energy sources. Small steps that are available in the wine making world, but each one is important.

The estates comprises 63 hectares of vines planted with every known clone of Riesling so that the estate can weather the potential storms of climatic change without worrying about the continuation of wine production - at least some of the many clones will survive heat spikes and floods!

They also have a huge amount of land situated in Grand Cru sites (Grosses Gewächs) and in most years parts of these vineyards go into making the other wines as well. They are careful, as you'd expect, and use hand-picking and almost zero sulphur, no artificial sweetening or acidification, relying instead on the various microclimates, soil types and altitudes to deliver the variety of quality that goes into the wines that go into the production of the wonderful tapestry of their output.

Lastly, the acid-sugar ratios are interesting - just over 9g per litre of sugar and just over 7 in terms of total acidity. That's normally in the sweet zone for white wines, but the acidity balances it to delicious satisfaction. Bearing in mind that the residual sugar in Coke is about 110g per litre and that some of the very widely available wines from Dada are bottles at 13g per litre, this wine looks as though it's almost skimping in sugar! It isn't - it's perfect as it is.