German Pinot Noir at the Edge

There is a kind of winegrower who will stand in a frozen vineyard at three in the morning, lighting candles one by one between the rows, because the alternative is to go back to bed and lose the year. Sebastian Fürst is that kind of grower. When frost came to Bürgstadt in April, he and his family went out into the dark with candles at around ten euros apiece and kept them burning until the danger passed. It is an old remedy, and like most old remedies, it works when you are willing to pay for it in money and in sleep.

The Fürsts have made wine in Franken since 1638. Their vines grow on red sandstone, rich in iron, on slopes that face the sun at a latitude where, not so long ago, ripening Pinot Noir was a matter of luck. Things have changed. The winemakers I met along this northern edge of the vine’s range speak of warmth with a certain caution, the way a farmer speaks of a good year. Sure, they are glad of the ripeness. But they are less glad of frosts that arrive after budbreak, storms that come out of nowhere, and seasons that no longer keep to the old timetable.

The 2015 vintage was warm and dry, and the Pinot Noirs show it. They have a roundness, a bit of baby fat, yet underneath there is the cool backbone you expect from these hills, and the acidity holds everything in place.

The Centgrafenberg was the finest red I tasted on the trip. It did not try to be Burgundy, though I suspect the Burgundians who count the Fürsts among their friends would recognise a kindred spirit in it. We drank it at the family table with venison and pasta made that morning, and I was told the deer had come from the woods above the vineyard. I believed it. That is how wine is meant to be drunk, with food from the same hillside and people who know where both came from.

Further north, in the narrow valley of the Ahr, the Stodden family has grown grapes in Rech since 1578. The slopes behind the winery are steep enough that nothing can be done except by hand, and climbing them gives you a healthy respect for the people who work them. In a few hectares you will find coloured slate, grey slate, greywacke, loam and loess, and Alexander Stodden’s wines reflect that mosaic. They are deep in colour and silky in texture, with a smoky note I have come to associate with good German Pinot. He uses French clones, but the wines speak with an Ahr accent.

POSTSCRIPT: I wrote these notes in 2017. In July 2021, the Ahr rose in the night and filled the cellars of the valley. Stodden lost his barrels, part of his vineyards and much of a vintage. The family rebuilt. When asked about it, Alexander did not blame the climate. The river flooded in 1901 too, he said, though there were fewer people living along it then.

Growers at the edge have always lived with extremes, and the good ones learn to meet them, with candles if need be.

This visit was part of the 2017 Masters of Riesling trip with Awin Barratt Siegel Wine Agencies.