Greet the Grape ~ Neuburger

...there are many unique autochthonous grape varieties growing in Austria, some several of which produce memorably flavorful wines. And among these varieties, many turn out to be spontaneous crossings of two previously established types—and certainly Mr Roter Veltliner wasn’t always all too concerned about whom he woke up next to in the morning…

Neuburger—literally, the “new citizen”—is one of these extraordinary products of ampelographic promiscuity—Roter Veltliner mating with Señora Sylvaner (as ‘posed to Zierfandler, which is what that old goat Roter did with Madame Traminer…)

legend has it that a floating bundle of grape-cuttings was fished out of the Danube some hundred-plus years ago, planted out of curiosity, and turned out to produce a hardy vine that needed so little moisture that, as Josef Högl puts it, “sometimes the dew is enough.”

he holds his liquor well, does this son of the river—Karl Lagler in Spitz, among others, bottles a Neuburger that does not lack for agility at 14% alcohol and even a touch more… Nikolaihof picks it earlier, gets it into the bottle a little lighter with a handsomely polished texture—quite a lovely wine.

once upon a time, Schildknecht and I were entertained there by the eternally gracious Christine Saahs, where we tasted all manner of wondrous Rieslings and GVs, both ancient and youthful. And we were invited to take any bottles from our tasting down to dinner, which we did. It was springtime, and so Spargelzeit, the asparagus season so beloved in Austria and Germany. And at the end of our dinner, surveying the wreckage of a groaning board, the mighty Rieslings and Grüne Veltliner—the Steiner Hund, the Im Weingebirge—stood yet half-full upon the table—but the Neuburger bottle was empty…

one thing that Wachauer Neub is not, however, is particularly aromatic. Mainly about texture and tongue—

elsewhere the wines turn out lighter and spicier, as proven by Karl Alphart, in the Thermenregion south of Vienna. His Neuburger “Hausberg”—out of deep brown soils with a bit of limestone—not only comes in at a modest 12.5%, but also shows aromatix that neither mom nor dad could’ve called their own. Lightly spiced and elegantly tropical, Hausberg finishes with a wave rather than a wallop.

Foto: © ÖWM/ Faber

while Thomas Mann was having a difficult evening, James was enjoying himself in the morning—...

————Zitat des Tages

——————Thomas Mann, im Tagebuch am 27.11.36
hinsichtlich einer Rundfunksendung der Venusbergmusik aus Tannhäuser:

"Die Romantik ist eine unsaubere Welt. Ich will nicht mehr viel davon wissen."

~

a memorable bit of Outdoor Beethoven—

having recently come back from a short week in Berlin, I got into a little discussion about Beethoven and other symphonists—along with the great conductors—on one of the wine boards.
Something that's worth recycling:

Berlin, Germany—9 November 2000

the country had seen in prior weeks an ugly spate of Turk-beatings and gay-bashings—a nasty trend toward skinhead violence. So the city of Berlin laid-on an official demonstration against Facism.

in the early dark I found myself among 200,000 other individuals gathered in Boulevard Unter den Linden, clear and cool.

Paul Spiegel, president of the Central Jewish Council, delivered a stirring address—blew a lot of lazy people's shit away, actually—
in memory of the Kristallnacht Pogrom of 9 November 1938.
Dr. Spiegel went on to point out—and people did not stop talking about this for a good while—that if one were truly opposed to violence against minorities, whether distinguished by colour, nation, sexuality or religious heritage, it became incumbent upon the individual to speak up and object whenever—at the dinner table or in the bar—jokes or stories were told making fun of this or that group, because in these seemingly innocent anecdotes lay the potential seeds of violence and murder.

nearly a quarter of a million people shoulder-to-shoulder while a great orator laid it on real thick...

and when the shouting died down at the end of Spiegel's address, there, on the bandstand in front of the Brandenburg Gate—
the Stadtskapelle Berlin, Daniel Barenboim on the podium.
—the four strokes of doom that open Beethoven's middle symphony.
this, ladies and gentlemen, was electric.
and in the finale, the excitement grew to nearly overwhelming.
Whoever coined the phraselet "to beat the band" must've had Barenboim in mind...

a quick word from across the water ~

I see some folks in the course of my travels who ask me why Austrian wines are comparatively expensive, and I tell them that most of the cheap stuff is actually disposed-of either in the village, or beyond that border most immediately to the west. Thanks to contributions from two Facebook friends, I have an example to show:

Falstaff Mario Scheuermann berichtet, wie peinlich österreichische Weine im deutschen Diskonter angepriesen werden. Ein Zweigelt, angeblich Reserve mit klingenden Beinamen wie "Swinging Mountain", "Pride auf Austria" und "really red". Ah geh! Um 1,49 Euro.

according to Falstaff magazine, (Hamburg-based) wine-critic Mario Scheuermann reports, how embarrassingly Austrian wines are promoted by German discount-stores (say, like Target or Wal-Mart). For 1,49€ (a little over two dollars) one can buy a Zweigelt—supposedly "Reserve"—with a sonorous (English language) nom-de-guerre like: Swinging Mountain, Pride of Austria or really red—

...ah gitaway!!!

winely reflections from boa-constrictor brunch ~

...this is of course none other than the famous illustration from Antoine Marie Jean-Baptiste Roger de Saint-Exupéry’s great novel, Le Petit Prince, which depicts un serpent boa, qui avalit un fauve—I beg permission for fair use—

and not hard to figure out, boa-brunch is when you cannot eat a thing for the rest of the day, and for me yesterday it was dim sum that done the deed.

but was interested to note, that along with the stuffed eggplant, the shu-mai, the crystal shrimp dumplings, the sesame-fried wontons—the better companion was not the grüner veltliner 08 Höhlgraben from Gerald Malat—but rather a riesling Smaragd—Josef Högl Vision 06, left over from visiting Tom McKnew and Dean Gold and Tony Quinn in DC on Wednesday.

—imagine that—we all know grüner is best with everything, and high-octane riesling Smaragd from ripe vintages proves too often problematic in the dining department—but on this occasion I was amazed at how, though the GV cleaned up quite nicely after each mouthfull, this big middle-linebacker of a riesling had the knack to fit and insinuate the corners and billows of its sweet, savoury and tart flavours into those of what for suburban NJ was really pretty respectable dim sum.

...depicted below, also © M de St.-Exupéry his heirs and assigns, what the serpent boa looks like (and feels like) after said brunch...

STERN magazine article about wine glasses...

—just did the following translation of stern magazine's article about the great wineglass taste-off for the folks at Zalto...

Clink! Georg Riedel can convince his customers. Bowing ever so slightly, he looks his guest straight in the eye, smiles revealing a couple of teeth, and touches his glass to the other. Cheers—Clink!

Change of scene: your own kitchen. Crick! Dry and harsh. This is the sound one fears. Another glass for the dustbin, the bowl twisted off the stem whilst drying. Usually one’s own fault, for not paying attention. Or do we blame the glass? Too fine, too fragile? And in the end is it worth it, the purchase and the price? Is it not just our imagination, that the flavour is better?

Georg Riedel creates wine glasses, perhaps the best of all. His work has been so successful that one either knows—or else at least has heard—that wine tastes better out of expensive glasses than it does out of the normal sort—say, the ones from IKEA. Riedel understands the customer’s anxiety over breakage, as he does their fear of being taken in by an expensive illusion. But he can answer those questions handily—he’s well-rehearsed.

To begin with, he eagerly demonstrates the resiliency of his glasses—he pours Burgundy into balloons—you could say they’re evocative of Brigitte Nielsen, long legged and voluminous. Scarcely have you picked up your stem to toast, he’s brought his glass against yours. Clink? That’s an understatement for these Burgundy-bells. GONNNNGG! is more like it… and not just GONNNNGG, but then the sound reverberates! And the glasses? They remain intact.

Okay, point made. Good first impression.
Now for the aromas and the flavour:
Riedel pours Champagne into a slender Champagne flute and pours the rest of the bottle—Brigitte is still there—into the emptied Burgundy-balloons. Compare them, please—Hmmm… smells like two different wines, tastes like different wines. Just a sec, says the guest, there must be a bit of Burgundy left in that glass from the previous flight...

Patience, says Mr Riedel. He pours the contents of the champagne glass into the burgundy-balloon. Swirls the wine about. Pours half of it back into the champagne glass. Let’s compare them again. Still smells, still tastes like two distinct wines. And that’s not the worst of it: The Champagne tastes better out of the Burgundy glass. The guest asks, And that’s going to spell the end for the Champagne flute? Riedel answers, Yes.

We found this rather impressive, so stern set to work, to carefully and systematically investigate the wineglass question. We invited the ten most important glass-works to a blind tasting, and asked them to send what they considered to be their best glasses for three wines—Riesling, Burgundy and Bordeaux. Hundreds of cartons had to be received and stored, 600 delicate glasses must be individually unpacked and unwrapped, then rinsed by hand, dried by hand and placed at the ready—and then after the tasting once again washed, dried, wrapped, packed and sent back to the glassworks. An endless amount of work, that was.

Work, that is, in service of you, the reader. Who can now feel sure of the answer to the following question: If the finer glasses are adequately sturdy, and can influence the flavour of a wine to such a degree, then is it worth the expense to buy them? And which ones to buy? Are all glasses created equal? Is hand-blown better than factory-made? And more importantly, can the untrained palate of the consumer distinguish the difference? This is a lot of money—a glass can cost as much as 55€.

All the major glassworks participated. They provided the jury of professionals and flew their directors in at their own expense, from Stockholm (Orrefors), Vienna (Lobmeyer and Zalto), and Munich (Riedel and Zwiesel). These glassworks specialists were complemented by ten experienced sommeliers to form the professional jury. Additionally, to represent the reader, stern invited 20 participants from magazine’s series Wine School—these individuals made up the consumer panel. The juries tasted separately from one another overseen by an eminent judge, a wine enthusiast who took a day’s holiday to participate.

In order to eliminate any influence of the glass’s physical form, making certain that only nose and mouth informed their opinion, the forty jurors wore blindfolds. And gloves, which made it difficult for the glassworks’ directors to recognise their own handiwork by the feel of its stem. In each flight the panellists had ten glasses in front of them, filled with the same wine. For white wine, it was a Riesling, 2005 Geheimrat J Spätlese Trocken from the estate of Geheimrat J. Wegeler. For the category of lighter aromatic red wines, the tasters were given a 2007 Spätburgunder Blauschiefer from the estate Mayer-Näkel in the Ahr valley. And for the group of full-bodied red wines, a 1997 Château de Pez, Crus Bourgeois from St.-Estephe was poured.

The jury considered which glass presented the wine best and most faithfully to its type—in the nose, on the tongue and on the palate. Additionally, they evaluated the glasses according to which felt the most agreeable in the hand, which was the best-balanced, and which provided the most effective contact with the taster’s lip. So that the tasters could find the stems without mishap, the glasses were served on a slotted cardboard surface, each one securely placed.

For each style of wine, each juror awarded twelve points in the category Aroma and Taste: five points for the winning glass, three for second place, and two to the third. For balance, manageability and mouth-feel, two points were given.

First conclusion:
The wines tasted markedly different out of different glasses. The choice of glass significantly determines how the wine presents itself. For the consumer panel as well, these differences were clearly perceptible. It’s confirmed: if you drink a fine wine out of a clunky glass—or out of a plastic cup—you waste much of the pleasure. But beware of assuming the opposite: Plonk that costs 2 Euros per bottle will not taste better out of a hand-blown glass; rather to the contrary, any weakness and flaw of a mass-produced wine comes to the fore.

Second conclusion:
There’s no such thing as the all-purpose glass. Certainly there are glasses that do well with several different styles of wine, which do offer a sort of lowest common denominator: glasses that combine a medium sized bowl with a tall tulip-shape and a relatively small opening.

And how about the ideal glass?
● no patterns and no colour
● large volume, to facilitate swirling
● light weight
● fine balance
● long stem
● thin walls
● no lip

Third conclusion:
Wine tastes better out of hand-blown glasses than it does out of machine made glasses. The professional jury inclined to make an exception for machine-made Bordeaux glasses, which they preferred to hand-blown examples. According to their evaluation, these felt better in the hand, more comfortable on the lip and imparted a more elegant tone to the wine. And even though the consumer panel gave first place in every category to a hand-blown glass, they gave good marks to the machine-made examples in the subsequent places. This jury preferred the heavier and sturdier glasses—particularly light and elegant stems were scored more reticently.


When one tallies up the points from professionals and consumers, Zalto, Zwiesel and Orrefors take the top spots. In one instance Stölzle worked its way into third place. Except for the glass from Stölzle (5,50€) these glasses are hand-made, delicate and relatively expensive (at 30€ or more). And if one considers the relationship of price to achievement, Stölzle comes out ahead. With noteworthy scores in every category, priced under seven Euros, they are the most affordable, followed by Leonardo and Riedel. Here hand-blown glasses—except for the comparitively inexpensive entry from Zalto—bring up the rear.

And not every grape variety needs its own glass, but every type of wine does—Burgundy, Bordeaux, white wine. The investment in glasses is worth it, more so as the price-difference even among hand-blown glasses is considerable. After the tasting, the chiefs of the glassworks returned home in a very reflective mood. And they’re seeing the results here in this issue for the first time, just like the reader.

But immediately after the tasting, one thing had become clear to market leader Georg Riedel: The competition is most certainly hot on our heels!