Dr Loosen Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling Kabinett 2007

Dr Loosen Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling Kabinett 2007 (Mosel, Germany)
$35, Screwcap, 7.5%
Winery Website

From a classic Mosel vineyard, in a classic year, this should be a cracker. However, Dr Loosen has also been the target of some tall poppy like allegations of slipping standards & slightly homogenised wines (particularly with the popularity of the Dr L), so I opened this with great interest.

Plenty of spritz in the glass, the colour is a very light green straw yellow. Very light indeed. The nose, once you get past the sulphur, is sharply defined & rather classic. Honey, slate, more slate & just a twinge of bath salt & honeysuckle RS – its very tight & typical of young, off dry Riesling from the formidable rocky Mosel slopes. (check out the vineyard picture below & follow the link above – interesting terroir!)

The palate starts dry before fast becoming quite typically sweet, with light, fruit tingle flavours flowing the whole length of the palate, talc flowing under the sweet juiciness. Its quite upfront and round, its sweetness very well judged, but still omnipotent – this is still, even though its marked as a ‘Kabinett’ style, a sweet wine. The key here is actually the perfection and balance. At no point does the sweetness become overbearing, with no botrytis to be found. Indeed the clean, perfect flow of ripe fruit is the main attraction here and minutes later I can still taste the slatey honeysuckle flavours.

The palate seems quite forward in structure, the fruit upfront and open, the acid backbone a side act & barely noticeable. Many would argue that this an early drinking wine, but that colour and freshness should provide plenty of scope for bottle evolution.

In the end I think many people will taste this and dismiss it as another off dry Mosel, but that is skipping over the purity at the core of this wine – its a quite classic & upfront off dry German Riesling of real balance. 17.5