In 1997 Andreas and Bernd Spreitzer leased the estate from their father, who remains active. Recently listed as a Gault-Millau discovery of the year, and now FEINSCHMECKER’s newcomer of the year, and a new listing in DM-magazine’s 100-best German vintners list.
Here are the stats: 11.5 hectares, producing about 6,500 cases per year. 92% Riesling, 8% Pinot Noir. All harvesting is by hand. The must is cleaned by gravity for 24 hours before whole-cluster pressing. After fermentation (in wood or jacketed stainless steel, partly with ambient yeasts partly with cultured yeasts, depending on the vintage) the wines rest on their gross lees for some time before receiving their only filtration, with racking. They are bottled off the fine lees. ~Terry Theise
Available Wines
It’s the Riesling foundation, this one, and a perfect adjunct to Dragonstone. Where Leitz’s wine often is as much edible as drinkable it always has the savor of grub this one is a super-polished, charming and incredibly flexible wine; aromas of peonies, lilacs and stones; the effectively invisible rs (27-28g.l., drier than Draggie) confers a coolness and refinement. The dry wine would be too arch, the sweeter one too eager to please, but this one is long, loveable and perfect.
The sweetness has been inching down each year, which makes me glad, because this ’10 shows you don’t need a lot of fructose to eke out this wines cider-y soul. This is a riot of apple, a pagan orgy of apples, apples reenacting Caligula (co-starring aloe-vera), an insanely, bewitchingly lip-smackingly delicious wine, as this is at its very best.
You know, your basic Riesling! It’s one-third each from Lenchen, Doosberg and the slatey Hallgartener Hendelberg; the base wine is Spätlese quality, and this wine works perfectly with exactly five more grams of sweetness than the ’09 had. And bless them for recognizing this and not yielding to formula-think! Mirabelle and apple skin, lots of dicht and mineralty, cool balsam and sorrel; everyday Riesling doesn’t improve on this.
CORE-LIST WINE. And now the drier regime is firmly established; more mirabelle and tart-apple and herbal snap; even (in ’13) green tea and sweet peas. ~Terry Theise
This is the best-ever vintage, and to my great joy it’s another of those used-to-be-too-sweet wines that gets drier each year. Lime-oil and empire apple; snappy and juicy. ~Terry Theise
From the cadaster parcel called Eisenberg (iron hill) from which a TBA was picked in 1921 which had the then-record must weight of 303º. As splashy as this is in its youth, it assumes a classical form with age, and a vertical we enjoyed last year was a revelation of how gorgeous this wine is after 5-7 years. This ’14 shows birch-smoke and iron, no discernible botrytis; tangy with a jajapeño twang, but I hesitate to memorialize this fleeting impression of a puppy that ages into such a Great Lady. ~Terry Theise
Vivid green apple in a brilliant and penetrating aroma, almost like the exotics of (the village of) Rauenthal. Not chaptalized; certainly the best since 2011 and maybe the best ever, a juicy hot-weather gulper that over-delivers and has a banshee energy. It is, of course, the “estate” Riesling in a form of perfect balance. ~Terry Theise
This used to be the Doosberg, and I’m sure it was changed to accommodate some arcane VDP diktat. In any case the wine is excellent; beautifully mineral and gently dry; white hyacinth; slim, demure and complex dialogue of flowers and rock dust.
