Schätzel | Rheinhessen | Riesling “Fuchs” | 2019 | 750ml | bio

Beschreibung

Product description for Schätzel Riesling “Fuchs” 2019 (bio)

Information about the wine

The Riesling Fuchs comes from a single vineyard within the Große Lage Hipping called Fuchsloch. It is a small plot with vines around 40 years old. The grapes were hand-picked in several harvests to achieve the golden cut, an early golden tannin. They were then foot-mashed and allowed to stand for three days before being pressed for 36 hours without pre-clarification. The spontaneous, non-temperature-controlled warm fermentation took place in old 600-liter wooden barrels until oxygen depletion occurred. Malolactic fermentation then took place in the barrel, and the wine was aged there for 35 months under a completely clean, reductive Flor yeast. This made it possible to bottle the wine unsulfured, unfiltered, and slightly naturally cloudy. The wine was processed entirely reductively. Had it been bottled earlier, the wine would have a similarly reductive quality to Kai Schätzel’s previous wines. At 11.5% ABV, it is 100% ABV. The wine has an alcohol content of 0.5 grams of residual sugar and 7 grams of acidity, and no added sulfur.

Colour

: Medium straw yellow, slightly cloudy

Nose

The Fuchs is essentially a Hipping Großes Gewächs with extended lees aging and a naturally cloudy bottling. The family resemblance to the 2020 Hipping is striking. It smells of apples, quinces, pears and their skins, wool wax, and apple cider with light hints of licorice and a touch of hops. There are also notes of a little grapefruit including its skins, some star fruit, and cape gooseberries. The wine appears open and inviting.

Palate

On the palate, the wine is intense, juicy, silky, and round. The freshness arises from the interplay of the polished acidity, a clear minerality, and the influence of the Flor yeasts. Added to this are fine tannins and mellow fruit. Here, too, cleanly produced natural wines from Anjou come to mind. For Rheinhessen, this style is still very rare. But this wine’s blend of tension and relaxation, its openness and self-confidence, are extremely attractive, and its structure, salinity, and juiciness ensure a pleasant drinking experience. Added to this is its impressive depth and length, which make this Fuchs wine very special overall.

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Keywords: Schätzel Riesling “Fuchs” 2019 bio Rheinhessen Germany

Wine Advocate

Score: 91+

From the Fuchsloch plot of the Hipping but produced as natural wine with Rheinischer Landwein status, the intensely yellow-colored 2019 Riesling Fuchs offers a pure, intense and herbal bouquet of ripe and spicy/herbal, finely phenolic but all in all juicy-elegant fruit. Lush and mouthfilling on the palate, this is a saline, very elegant and intense, beautifully fleshy dry Riesling that tastes much less wild than it shows in the glass. It is a medium-bodied, harmonious, finely textured and saline-finishing Riesling that should be decanted to soften the phenolic grip a bit. Or simply open the bottle a week before. Then don’t forget so shake the lees. 11% stated alcohol. Bottled in mid-August this year. Natural cork. Tasted at the domaine in August 2022.
Stephan Reinhardt

Vinous

Score: 90

The old name for one of Schätzel’s parcels in Hipping was ‘Fuchsloch’, so the Landwein name was simply shortened to Fuchs. The 2019 was bottled after three years under flor in barrel. The slightly cloudy but golden wine has a flicker of reduction that blends beautifully with the intense Amalfi lemon nose that is suffused with salty yeastiness. The palate is buffered and mellow yet backed by Riesling’s inherent acidity. The result is a serene, pure, yet yeasty evocation of clear citrus. Lightness, acidity, texture and yeast combine into a very understated but convincing and, above all, clean wine that feels like a balm. (Bone-dry)
— Anne Krebiehl MW
Drinking window: 2023 – 2035
Review date: Sep 2023

Producer website: https://www.schaetzel.de/home