Riesling, Grand Cru, Schlossberg, 2010

For all of the tension of the vintage and the richness of Weinbach's wines, this Schlossberg cuvee maintains its inherent composure and refinement. This is very classy dry Riesling, poised, refreshing, challenging and complex, offering wonderful terroir-driven flavours of stones and minerals together with tangy sherbert, tangerine, lime and orange zest notes. Exquisite. Schlossberg is a fabulous vineyard that was the first classified Grand Cru in Alsace. Based on a granite parent rock, the soils in Schlossberg are sandy, rich in minerals, not very deep at the top of the slope (400 metres of altitude), but deeper at the bottom (230 metres). Because of its steep slopes with a south exposure, Schlossberg needs terracing. The quality of this very famous vineyard was well known as early as the fifteenth century. It was the first Alsacian soil classified as a Grand Cru under the 1975 decree. Schlossberg is an extraordinary soil for Riesling, it gives it very pure fruitiness, personality and remarkable finesse.