Domane Wachau Federspiel Bruck Riesling 2018
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The wine is lively yellow with green reflections. The distinctive “Bruck-style” is smoky with a precise structure and complex rich stone fruit aromas and exotic. The palate is balanced and elegant tasting of peach, ripe apricot and delicious apple. The persistent minerality and racy acidity are well balanced by this wine’s full-body and lasting-finish. Serve well chilled at about 9°C. Riesling Federspiel is a classic accompaniment to a wide range of fish, poultry and vegetable dishes or may be enjoyed as a sophisticated summer wine.
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Wine Enthusiast
Gentle but bright and sunny notes of lemon on the nose find their echo on the lithe palate. Green apple and zesty lemon play against a backdrop of fresh, creamy yeast on a very slender, fresh body with a dry and really zesty finish.
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The winery is led by MW Roman Horvath, whose team works closely with growers, and has instituted a vineyard quality assurance program. This sustainable vineyard management program includes measures of quality cultivation and is customized according to specific vineyards and vintage.
Austria imposes very stringent wine laws, and the Wachau region goes beyond these with their quality categories of Steinfeder, Federspiel and Smaragd to assure uncompromising quality.
The Wachau, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, stretching from the banks of the Danube, benefits from the river’s role as a climate regulator. Many of the vineyards are very steep and terraced with very old, dry stone walls. The very best vineyards are vinified separately to produce single vineyard Gruner Veltliners and Rieslings.
Riesling possesses a remarkable ability to reflect the character of wherever it is grown while still maintaining its identity. A regal variety of incredible purity and precision, this versatile grape can be just as enjoyable dry or sweet, young or old, still or sparkling and can age longer than nearly any other white variety. Somm Secret—Given how difficult it is to discern the level of sweetness in a Riesling from the label, here are some clues to find the dry ones. First, look for the world “trocken.” (“Halbtrocken” or “feinherb” mean off-dry.) Also a higher abv usually indicates a drier Riesling.
As Austria’s most prestigious wine growing region, the landscape of the Wachau is—not surprisingly—one of its most dramatic. Millions of years ago, the Danube River chiseled its way through the earth, creating steep terraces of decomposed volcanic and metamorphic rock. Harsh Ice Age winds brought deposits of ancient glacial dust and loess to the terrace’s eastern faces. Today these steep surfaces of nutrient-poor and fast draining soil are home to some of Austria’s very best sites for both Grüner Veltliner and Riesling.
Wachau is small, comprising a mere three percent of Austria’s vine surface and, considering relatively low yields, represents a miniscule proportion of total wine production. Diurnal temperature shifts in Wachau facilitate great balance of sugar and phenolic ripeness in its grapes. At night cold air from the Alps and forests in the northwest displace warm afternoon air, which gets sucked upstream along the Danube.
Its sites are actually so varied and distinct that more emphasis is going into vineyard-designated offerings even despite grape variety. Grüner Veltliner and Riesling are most prominent, but the region produces Chardonnay, Pinot Blanc (Weissburgunder), Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc and Zweigelt among other local variants.