2017 A.J. Adam Dhroner Hofberg Riesling Spätlese
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Tasting notes
A lightly stinky combination of narcissus perfume, smoky black tea and fermentative remnants shares aromatic billing with zesty orange and ripe white peach. The palate is invigoratingly pungent but also glossy and lusciously juicy. An undertone of wet stone and an influx of marine minerals serve for grounding and salivary stimulation on a vibrantly sustained finish. (These vines, planted in 1953 and featuring loose, botrytis-resistant clusters, are almost always the source for Adam’s Hofberg Spätlese. Apologies for having allowed a misprint – “1973” – to creep into my note on this wine’s vintage 2016 predecessor.)
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Average Score
Stephan Reinhardt, Wine Advocate
David Schildknecht, Vinous
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The 2017 Dhroner Hofberg Riesling Spätlese is from a warmer but slatey part of the Hofberg closer to the Mosel and was picked in October (later than the Kabinett) at 94° Oechsle. It has a clear, fresh citrus color and opens with an intense, ripe but fine and slightly reductive bouquet of white and yellow stone fruit and buttered, stewed apples. On the palate, this is a mouth-filling, refined, elegant, harmonious and very fine Spätlese with a creamy texture and a salty-piquant, crystalline finish. This is a very sexy picture-book Spätlese from the Hofberg that already drinks very well and quite surely will continue to do so over the next 20+ years. Tasted in April 2019.