Riesling Terrassen [Nakt] 2017

Things happen on Odinstal.

Since this cultural landscape at the highest spot in the Palatinate was revived, it has been constantly listening closely and reinventing itself.

This unique wine, of which only 450 filled bottles exist, is a Riesling from terraced plots. A marriage, in proportionate order, of the 2017, 2016 and 2015 vintages, it is also extraordinarily special in that this site has experienced neither copper nor sulphur in its plant protection in recent years.

Accordingly unfiltered and unsulphured filled this wine is minimalism without vowels written.

The wine shows itself in bright yellow with tendencies to ochre yeasty cloudy but shiny in the glass.

Besides the typical notes of green apple and apricots, notes of hops, tarragon and basil blossom are strikingly determined and contribute immense herbal freshness. A subtle hint of cinnamon and rhubarb impart warmth and depth. The wine requires patience, air and a large glass, because it delights in always being changeable.

Yellow-fleshed fruit teasingly meets vegetal flavours. Persimmon fruit and discreetly greenish banana, as well as mirabelles and fermented gooseberries get amicably involved in an aromatic finger-wagging with avocado, Hokkaido pumpkin and young fresh corn. Also, the aroma of the head of a freshly tapped ice-cold Hefeweizen beckons you to sip. Although the nose of this unsulphured wine has a mind of its own, the essence of Riesling, even if it is hidden at first, cannot be denied and merely appears in a different guise.

Driven by lascivious, just cuddling silky tannins, the 2017 Riesling Terrassen [Nakt] nestles unrestrained on the palate. Andreas Schumann has brought to life a Riesling that is as honest as it is idiosyncratic and unique.

The delightful mist of the face of murky wine and the nasal memoirs of a Palatinate fermenter evaporate with a fizz as they hit the mucous membranes, transforming diffusion into crystalline purism. Armed with chiseling acid, like a nine-year-old rascal with water balloons on the balcony, this wine-derived Odinstal slaps liquid naïve joie de vivre in your face. His tickling stimulating train on the palate is on full speed in the direction of never-never land and who thinks something nice begins to fly...