Germany · Mosel Saar Ruwer · White · Still · wine-wine · 1091625
Lowest offer: 42.50 GBP (Buy)
Offers: 2 · Bids: 0
| Price / case | Vintage | Packing | Qty | Location |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 522.50 GBP | 2007 | 12 x 75cl | 1 | uk / United Kingdom |
| 255.00 GBP | 2010 | 6 x 75cl | 1 | uk / United Kingdom |
No active bids.
| Vintage | Packing | Offers | Bids | Market price | WA rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2003 | 12 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | ||
| 2007 | 12 x 75cl | 1 | 0 | ||
| 2010 | 6 x 75cl | 1 | 0 | ||
| 2015 | 12 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | 3677.76 | 92 |
| 2015 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | 1838.88 | 92 |
| 2016 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | 93 | |
| 2017 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | 93 | |
| 2018 | 12 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | 4526.04 | |
| 2018 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | 2263.02 | |
| 2019 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | ||
| 2020 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | 93 | |
| 2022 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 | ||
| 2023 | 6 x 75cl | 0 | 0 |
Rating: 93 –93
The 2020 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese is clear yet pretty reductive on the nose and doesn't yet sing if poured straight from the just opened bottle. The palate is crystalline, fine and lush, very elegant and complex and reveals fine and salty grip on the intense and sustainable finish. 7.5% alcohol. Natural cork. Tasted in September 2021.
Rating: 94 –94
The 2019 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese is precise, fresh and pure on the nose that displays notes grated lemon rind and crushed stones. Round, piquant and juicy on the palate, this is an utterly refined yet sustainable and firmly structured Spätlese with dense and vibrating fresh Riesling fruit whose sweetness is well-compensated by mineral grip, salinity and tension. 7.5% alcohol. Tasted from AP 08 20 in June 2010.
Rating: 93 –93
The 2016 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese is clear and precise on the deep and flinty nose that also shows some floral aromas. Round, lush and sweet on the palate, with delicate acidity and lingering salinity, this is an elegant and already very accessible Spätlese with a very fine, aromatic, mineral, piquant and salty finish. A classic. Tasted March 2018.
Rating: 92 –92
The 2015 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese is super ripe and intense on the nose, with ripe apple aromas, but less spicy and flinty flavors. Very intense and lush on the palate, this is a generous and fruit-intense Spätlese with fine acidity, and good mineral grip and structure. This wine is a decade too early to show all its talents, which are also hindered by sulfur. The finish is pure and salty, but also concentrated, lush and aromatic.
Rating: 93 –93
The 2013 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese starts very clear and subtle on the nose where the finest slate and bright fruit aromas are displayed with a dash of lemon juice. Lean and full of finesse, yet also deep, well concentrated, nicely juicy and piquant on the palate, this sweet and piquant Riesling develops a great intensity along with a lingering, tension-filled salinity. There is a beautiful grip and lovely fruitiness in the extremely stimulating and almost drying finish, which promises excellent aging potential.
Rating: 92 –92
Ripe, yellow-fleshed stone-fruit aromas, along with slate and herbal notes lead the 2012 Graacher Himmelreich Riesilng Spätlese to a rich, sweet, juicy and piquant palate of great elegance and complexity.
Rating: 92 –92
Schaefer's 2014 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese opens with an intense, yet refined and lovely, smoky bouquet of fully ripe grapefruit and Riesling flavors. Juicy and piquant on the densely textured palate, this is a mouthful of elegant Riesling whose sweetness is balanced by a racy and still vehement acidity that leads to a complex and mineral finish. Keep this excellent Spätlese for another 6-10 years before you slowly start enjoying it.
Rating: 93 –93
The 2017 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese is still discreet and yeasty on the elegant, intense, well-balanced and promising nose. Lush and generous on the palate, it has almost exuberant fruit but fine and persistent mineral acidity that takes it to a long, promising finish. This is another rather food-friendly Spätlese whose sweetness is reduced or beautifully balanced by the excessive mineral terroir character. The 2017 is still a baby straight from the bottle, but it's worthy of cellaring with pride for two or three decades. Tasted in March 2019.
Rating: 91 –91
Bright, zesty apple, lime and grapefruit donate aromatic pizzazz and generous refreshment to the Schaefers’ 2010 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spatlese, whose suggestions of brown spices and herbal essences, along with saliva-inducing salinity and scallop-like savor as well as a classic Mosel cantus firmus of wet stone, make for a levitating and irresistible performance that finishes with tenacity and panache. This promises to remain a hit for at least the next quarter of a century. “You had to keep delaying harvest,” says Christoph Schaefer, “but when it did come time, a significant share of the crop needed to be picked pretty quickly,” due to pressure from botrytis. Of course, when two experienced grower-owners have only ten – albeit extremely morsellated – acres to tend, 2010 challenges are a bit more manageable. “It was really important this year,” Schaefer junior continues, “to let the small amount of fruit that was still green hang, because such bunches were retarded in ripeness; high in malic acid; and would have been very noticeable in a blend.” “Even if you have only 10 or 20% of those sour grapes in the picking, you’ll never get that sour note out of the wine” adds Willi Schaefer, who is a champion in other contexts of including fresh green-gold grapes in one’s material, but suspects that failure to recognize the aforementioned danger was the cause of many a disappointing 2010. Notwithstanding – but also not contradicting – that opinion, as I noted in my introduction to this vintage, many Mosel growers observed not only higher concentration of total acidity in precisely their botrytized fruit but also the locking-in of more malic, and as my tasting notes demonstrate, the acids in some of the Schaefers’ most botrytized batches bordered on the obstreperous. “Only after fermentation – in which a significant (but variable) amount of acidity is lost anyway – can you really tell the structure of your wine,” insists Christoph Schaefer, “so what de-acidifying we did – largely in Q.b.A. and Kabinett – was as a correction to wine.” Willi Schaefer is keen to remind us that what tastes balanced is partly an imponderable function of terroir. “You’ll see that ten grams of finished acidity tastes well-integrated and -buffered in wine from one parcel, while a wine with approximately the same gross analysis from another parcel tastes sour. When I see bunches looking and tasting a certain way, and I know where they’re growing, then the analysis doesn’t interest me; I know the wine is going to turn out right.” You can taste that sort of confidence in a 2010 performance from Schaefers of unusual qualitative consistency, even if there will be differences of opinion as to the potential greatness of certain wines that are extreme in ways which would only in this vintage fail to elicit a gasp. “You can’t really say that earlier or later pickings were more successful this year,” adds Schaefer senior, but as at so many top Middle Mosel addresses this year, Spatlese and Auslese predominate, an outcome of which nobody even dreamt at the end of 2010’s rainy September. Only the heaviest lees were separated in January and the rest left in the wines until bottling, which (with the exception of this year’s tiny, sole trocken batch) took place a month later than usual in June. Importer: Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel. (516) 677-9300
Rating: 91 –91
Not only is there a yeasty, slightly cheesy veil over the nose of Schaefer’s 2011 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spatlese, there’s also a surprising whiff of petrol. Beyond that, vintage-typical effusively ripe apple and Persian melon are also wreathed in honeysuckle and lily-of-the-valley for a buoyant, wafting palate impression that tingles with citrus zest, crystalline mineral impingement, and saliva-liberating salinity in a long, infectiously juicy finish. I’m keeping faith with this and am confident it will shed its fermentative aromatic residues over the short term. “What there was of botrytis was fantastic,” says Christoph Schaefer, “nicely dried and beautiful, but there wasn’t much – nothing compared with 2010 (when it comes to quantities of botrytis wine). But all of the other fruit was wonderfully ripened to Kabinett or Spatlese and what we got over and beyond that came through selecting. With the good October weather we could organize our time and pick without urgency.” “We tried picking earlier but weren’t happy with the results,” adds Willi Schaefer. “We had to wait until the middle to end of October to get optimal flavors. The old vines always have the quality in them and we don’t need to worry. They have their rhythm, and whether they get a bit more or a bit less botrytis we just have to wait and see. It’s really interesting in retrospect,” he continues, “to compare 2011 and 2010. According to the analyses, you’d think ‘there’s a world of difference between these two,’ but in 2010 the acidity is well-buffered whereas in 2011 the wines taste higher in acidity than they are, so the difference is not so enormous.” Certainly there are few 2011 Mosel Rieslings, though, that better illustrate this vintage’s potential to delivery levity and refreshment along with ripeness than do those of Weingut Willi Schaefer. “More Schaefer than 2011” was how Christophe Schaefer pithily but profoundly characterized his A.P. #10, and arguably that applies to all of this vintage’s most successful Schaefer offerings. Bottling was, as usual, in April and May, but while the wines were for the most part left on their fine lees until then – both Schaefers supporting the notion that this was beneficial in 2011, albeit for reasons other than those that applied in 2010 – some of them were racked to tank over the winter as it was felt that more exchange of oxygen in cask was not what most infant 2011s needed. Importer: Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel. (516) 677-9300
Rating: 89 –89
The Schaefers’ 2005 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spatlese offers very ripe apple, banana, exotic, pungent (narcissus-like) flowers, and a hint of botrytis honey in the nose. In the mouth, this is quite creamy and rich, with its very ripe and fairly exotic personality extending through the finish, where subtle notes of mineral salt help invigorate the palate. Importer: Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel. (516) 677-9300
Rating: 92 –92
Their 2006 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spatlese features effusive honeysuckle, orange blossom, and heliotrope; pure, fresh apple and peach fruit; and a honeyed glaze of botrytis very subtly deployed. Remarkably, one has on the one hand the special creaminess and ethereal aromatic high tones of botrytis, on the other a taste vividly like that of ripe, fresh grapes – such as one gets from a perfectly-rendered sweet muscat. I wrote of vintage 2005 as representing a return to the incomparable level of quality that long prevailed at this address, and fans of Willi Schaefer and is son Christoph will be delighted to learn that their two subsequent vintages are as fine as any that have come from this cellar, and that they’ve increased acreage at least a bit in an effort to assuage the demand that now rages at home as well as abroad. That said, the harvest of 2006 was a perfect example of why Willi Schaefer has so long resisted acquiring more vines. “It was a race,” Christoph says, “in order to preserve our style of wine” and an intimate knowledge of each parcel and ability to make quick decisions were essential. “In the first week of October,” notes Willi Schaefer, “we still had half-way normal yields, but after that the crop shriveled. And the beautiful truth is that the acids concentrated, too.” By corralling friends and relatives from the village, Schaefers were able to muster 25 pickers the second week, their largest team ever. It certainly paid off! Importer: Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel. (516) 677-9300
Rating: 92 –92
A 2007 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spatlese continues in the sappy, juicy mold of the Domprobst A.P. #12. Fresh apple (think of the best Normandy cider) mingles with anise and vanilla. The freshness here is combined with a relatively spare texture; and the finish surprises with the intensity and length of salt and stone that accompany its sheer refreshment. In fact, if wine can be profoundly refreshing, here is a case in point. This bracing young Spatlese is likely to undergo more dramatic changes in bottle, I predict, than many of the other Schaefer wines of the vintage. But I would not hesitate to plan on charting those changes over the next 20 years. Willi Schaefer and Christoph harvested until mid-November. “There wasn’t any botrytis until the end of October,” relates Schaefer senior, “and what little botrytis there was, was clean.” Some of the excitement here, though, comes at the light end of the Oechsle scale. This year’s Schaefer Kabinetts represent outstanding values. But more than that, they display by turns delicacy and density, jewel-like intricacy and simplicity, elective affinity for our appetites and mystery, such as only a great work of nature confers. And if you prefer that they taste less sweet, just don’t start drinking them before they reach age ten! Importer: Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel (516) 677-9300
Rating: 93 –93
Musk melon, pink grapefruit, tangerine, and lemon on the nose of Schaefers’ 2009 Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spatlese exhibit on the palate ravishing delicacy and refreshment, along with a sense of transparency to invigorating salinity and subtle shadings of nut oils and wet stone. There is also an unusual note of roasted peanuts, and suggestions of green tea and aromatic herbs that persist in the wine’s saliva-inducing; invigorating, yet somehow cooling as well as next sip-compelling finish. This should delight for a quarter century. Most of the harvest of 2009 here was accomplished during the second half of October. "We'd actually reckoned with an earlier start," remarks Christophe Schaefer, "but although the grapes looked beautiful, when we tasted them we thought, 'no we really need to – and we can – wait.'" "The grapes were very stable," adds Willi Schaefer, "and when we did get botrytis – encouraged by a bit of October rain – it dried up nicely. And when you get this sort of late botrytis, it can really concentrate already high acids." Furthermore, parcels in Graach had retained their foliage after the one-night cold snap in early October. All of this year's wines remained on their fine lees at least through March, and the Schaefers pointed out that choices about which to bottle at what Pradikat level were usually made only from cask as the wines evolved, since with the exception of late pickings notably influenced by botrytis, the character of fruit was remarkably uniform. Another feature of 2009 that the Schaefers emphasized was high skin-to-juice ratios, something I certainly thought discernable even before they mentioned this. As a result their yields ended up being even lower than they had been anticipated on the basis of eyeballing and measuring the incoming volume of grapes. Importer: Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel. (516) 677-9300
Rating: 91 –91
Sweet herbal teas, flowers, and pears can be discerned in the nose of the 2003 Riesling Spatlese Graacher Himmelreich. Medium-bodied, silky-textured, and well-balanced, this beauty reveals creamy flavors of spiced linden tea and chamomile that linger in its long finish. A plump yet fresh wine, it should be consumed over the next 12 years. Bravo to Willi Schaefer for having crafted such beauties! Importer: Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel. (516) 677-9300