2015 Weingut Georg Breuer, Riesling Trocken, Estate Rudesheim, Rheingau Germany.
The 2015 Estate Trocken, sourced from a combination of sites, is a slate driven and soulful bone dry Riesling with brisk energy and earthy tones showing a steely core of liquid mineral, wet stone/flirt, gala apple, mint, fresh picked apricot, lime and grapefruit, adding a touch of raw ginger, cheese, verbena, petrol and melon rind. This is saline rich and really peaks up the saliva glands and even in a ripe vineyard is filled with zesty acidity, leaving a sharp and detailed in not austere sensation. The late Bernhard Breuer, Therea’s father, was one of the key members of Charta, an organization formed to promote a drier style of Rheingau wine. According to Terry Theise, Breuer’s famous importer, Bernhard was a proponent of this style of wine, and believed that the Rheingau was perfectly suited to producing very fine, elegant and flavorful dry Reislings, something that the younger Breuer has continued and excelled at. Theise adds, fermentations are natural or started with pied de cuve (vineyard started yeasts) with most fermentation and elevage in large used barrels for the top wines and a mix of barrel and steel for the Estate wines such as this one.
With a history dating back to the 1880’s, Weingut Georg Breuer is one of the most important small estates in the Rudesheim area of the Rheingau with prestigious holding in the famed Rudesheimer Grand Crus of Berg Schlossberg, Berg Roseneck and Berg Rottland, some of the best Riesling sites in Germany. Breuer, now run by Theresa Breuer, who has in recent years elevated the wines and converted to organic practices along with her manager Hermann Schmoranz and Swede cellar master Markus Lunden. Theresa also has her sister Marcia and her mum around to help out, and you can usually find the family in the winery or their newer tasting room and old cellars in the heart of old town Rudesheim, where I’ve visited them a few times since 2009. Tasting Breuer’s wines is also a pleasure and the 2015 Estate Trocken, one of the entry level bottlings, is a well crafted example and shows the regions terroir influence it’s a great value too. That said, you’ll be even more thrilled by Theresa’s single Cru wines, especially her Schlossberg and Roseneck, as well as her Monopole site, Nonnenberg in Rauenthal, which is set on much different soils and can be more exotic in nature than the more stoic Rüdesheimer wines. Breuer is on a hot streak of vintages since 2012 and their 2015, 2016 and the much acclaimed 2017’s are all seriously delicious.
($26 Est.) 92 Points, grapelive