Revisiting Vienna and Grüner Veltliner
Continuing my COVID quarantine virtual traveling down memory lane with Austria. I’ve already (re)visited Austria with my post about Steiermark. This time around I’m focusing not on a region but on a grape: Grüner Veltliner.
The closest I’ve come to Grüner Veltliner territory, or Gru-Ve (as it briefly became known) have been a few flying trips to Vienna. I first visited Vienna while I was in university. I’d just completed a German language summer program in Tübingen, Germany and was doing a two week, whirlwind tour of the “rest” of Europe.
My second trip was eight years later. At that time I was a far more seasoned traveler although my German was significantly worse for lack of use. It was an odd and kind of bittersweet return to Vienna because I actually had no intention of going near Austria at all on that trip. I was supposed to be setting up an office in Belgrade. But it was February 2008 and Kosovo declared independence and Belgrade went insane. I called my home office to tell them that rioters were trying to burn down the American embassy and what did they want me to do. “Umm…we’ll call you back.”
The next morning I had tickets to Vienna and instructions to go there and sit tight for a few days until they determined if I could return to my work in Belgrade or not. So I had a couple days of free holiday wandering around the city of Mozart and drinking Glühwein directly after breakfast.
None of which has anything to do with Grüner Veltliner though so let’s get on with the reason we’re here!
Grüner Veltliner
Grüner Veltliner is not the king of Austrian grapes for no reason. Well-known for its high acidity and flavors that range from citrus and white pepper to stone fruit, spice, and honey, Grüner Veltliner is site-sensitive and capable of producing a mind-boggling array of styles from light and lively, oak aged, highly ripe Prädikat wines, and sparkling.
Possibly most well-known in Niederösterreich, it is widely planted in Austria especially in Niederösterreich (particularly Wachau, Kamptal, Kremstal, and the Weinviertel) and northern Burgenland. It likes loess soils but does well in stony gravel and elsewhere but has to be carefully managed as it is naturally a high-yielding grape. The grape’s parentage remains uncertain but it’s likely a cross of Traminer and St. Georgen.
I’ve never been able to get my hands on any of the riper Prädikat wines but I am so in love with the lively and peppery styles I have had.
Domäne Wachau Federspiel, 2016
Domäne Wachau produces a wide range of wines from Grüner Veltliner. And I do mean wine. Some three dozen different wines spanning regional, village and single-vineyard wines as well as lively Steinfeder, elegant Federspiel and rich Smaragd wines. The wine I got from Domäne Wachau was a Federspiel which was indeed elegant.
Alcohol: 12%
Color: intense lemon
Nose: Intense with mineral and green (grassy) notes, gooseberry and apricot fruits, and a whiff of white pepper
Palate: Dry with vibrant citrus and gooseberry flavors and spicy white pepper with a saline finish. Elegant and structured with a lively acidity that keeps you coming back for more.
Weingut Bründlmayer Kamptal Terrassen, 2015
Weingut Bründlmayer is in Langenlois, some 70km north-west of Vienna. Here the vineyards receive protection from surrounding forests from cold north-westerly winds. Daytime sun warms stony terraces while cool air from the Langenloiser Arena brings down temps at night. The winery’s Grüner Veltliner blends grapes from its different terraced vineyards to take advantage of the grapes that express schist and granite soils as well as fertile loess.
Alcohol: 12.5%
Color: medium lemon
Nose: Aromas of flint and saline, elder flower, citrus fruits, and spicy arugula
Palate: Complex layers of grapefruit, citrus pith, white pepper, arugula, and green almonds sang with lively acidity and a long, dry finish.
Weingut F.X. Pichler Loibner Federspiel, 2016
This Loibner Federspiel is not only one of the very very few Grüner Veltliner wines we can get in Turkey, it’s one of the very very few Austrian wines we get period. Family run since 1898 F. X. Pichler’s vineyards in the Wachau lie on the southern side of the Danube and are planted in steep terraces.
Alcohol: 12%
Color: intense lemon
Nose: Quartzy mineral aromas wrapped around a fruit core, with lime zest, flint, and green apple
Palate: On the palate the wine is a little spritzig (effervescent) and dry. Like the aroma profile, palate flavors were intense and full of green apple, green apple peel, citrus zest, flint, and splashes of fresh lime juice highlighted by a racy acidity.
Goldeck, NV
Goldeck is a sekt producing winery only. It’s a great example of how you don’t have to do everything if you do one thing really well. Goldeck, which is not a small producer by any means, makes only three wines (all sparkling): Grüner Veltliner, Welschriesling and Zweigelt Rosé. And yes, they do it well.
Alcohol: 12%
Color: deep gold, persistent bubbles
Nose: Rising bubbles burst, releasing a spicy floral and fruity bouquet of elder flower, pear blossom, pear, and pepper.
Palate: A fine mousse filled the mouth with flavors of green grapes, pear, and elder flower. Dry with acidity as lively as the bubbles. Utterly charming.
Schlumberger Brut, 2015
The story of Schlumberger begins, not in Austria, but in France where Robert Alwin Schlumberger was the cellar and production manager at Ruinart Pére et Fils in Reims. He would eventually return to Austria to found his own winery in 1842 and dedicate it to making traditional method sparkling wines.
Alcohol: 12%
Color: pale lemon with green highlights and vigorous bubbles
Nose: Ripe stone fruit aromas of white peach with bright citrus, honey, and beeswax
Palate: Dry with fine bubbles and flavors that leaned more tree fruit than stone fruit. Persistent flavors of apple and pear and hints of lime zest and flint that carried through to a clean, medium finish. Very pretty. Very nice.