Rheingau: Historic, Venerable, Rejuvenated

Rheingau

Rheingau wasn’t the first German wine region I set foot in so many years ago. That distinction belongs to the Pfalz by way of Alsace, where I’ll never forget the jolting contrast of tasting in Müller-Catoir’s elegant salon followed by a lunch of sow’s stomach at a nearby roadhouse. My introductory tour of Germany’s vineyards continued through the Rheinhessen and Nahe before arriving at the dock of Bingen am Rhein. Bingen lies at the confluence of the Nahe and Rhine Rivers. It is an important transportation point that explains why the Celts and Romans settled here. A car ferry will transport you and your vehicle across the broad Rhine river from Bingen to the charming village of Rüdesheim. It’s a dramatic way to arrive in Rheingau, one of Germany’s most historic and revered wine regions.

Rheingau claims to be the birthplace of Riesling, planted here since at least 1435, but the Romans cultivated vines on its slopes long before that. Charlemagne encouraged vine plantings on the Rüdesheimer Berg, and the Benedictines and Cistercians tended vines at Johannisberg and Steinberg in the middle ages. We can thank the monasteries for some of today’s German wine labeling terms. Cabinet first appeared in 1712 at Kloster Eberbach, indicating wines of exceptional quality. Schloss Johannisberg asserts that a new wine style called Spätlese was born by chance in 1775 due to a messenger’s delay. Aristocratic estates like Schloss Schönborn and Freiherr Langwerth von Simmern persist, but like the healing waters of Wiesbaden, a new generation of vintners is rejuvenating the Rheingau scene.

Fresh off the ferry, my first appointment in the Rheingau was with Heinrich Breuer of Weingut Georg Breuer in Rüdesheim. This address seemed a logical place to start exploring Rheingau’s new wave. Breuer was at the forefront of a dry wine movement in the mid-1980s that influenced other producers in the region and inspired a return to German wine as it was in the early 20th century: dry and with emphasis on its great terroirs. A case in point is the thirty or so VDP.Rheingau members and their adherence to the association’s dry wine quality standards and vineyard classification. Like Weingut Kaufmann and Peter Jakob Kühn, many of its producers are fully engaged in biodynamics, while young and exciting producers like Eva Fricke draw attention to some of Rheingau’s forgotten corners. It’s time to return to Rheingau, where the renown of German wine began.