2016 Oestricher Klosterberg Riesling
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Tasting notes
Scents of fresh lemon and lemon oil, iris and peony capture the attention. On a silken, faintly waxy palate, juicy white peach and lemon are glowingly marked by the piquancy of their pit and pips, all impressions contributing to a gripping finish of almost severe intensity that adds nuts and crushed stone to the mix. There is more sense of stuffing here than in the wines that preceded it in the Kühns’ 2016 line-up – no doubt due at least in part to marginally higher alcohol – but in the end delightful buoyancy prevails. I also detect hints of oak, and it may be that the relative newness of one or more casks has been a factor in the relative dearth of primary juiciness and salinity here compared with other Kühn 2016s. This will be one to revisit. (For important information about the location where this wine grows, consult my tasting note on the corresponding 2014.)
Critic scores
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Stephan Reinhardt, Wine Advocate
David Schildknecht, Vinous
More reviews and scores
The 2016 Rheingau Riesling Oestricher Klosterberg "Erste Lage" is from a vineyard planted with 10,000 vines per hectare on loess and clay soils 30 years ago. Aged for ten months on the lees in a 30-hectoliter oak vat, the wine opens with a deep, complex, intensely fruity but also pure and mineral bouquet that indicates high-class Riesling. Generous, round and creamy on the palate with a hint of new oak and juicy Mirabelles, this is a still young but highly elegant and finessed Riesling with fine tannins. The finish is long and intense, but the Klosterberg is still developing. "The wine needed a long time to calm down," says Peter Bernhard Kühn. However, the nose is so promising that I am pretty sure this will be a great, well-structured Riesling in a couple of years.