This is simply one of the absolute best affordable bottles I’ve had in a long time; and I drink an absurd amount of affordable bottles. It’s a curious 50/50 blend of Riesling and Müller-Thurgau. “Steillage” means steep vineyard; this is some serious terroir. The wine is bright and elegant and clear (the Riesling, I assume?), but also a bit more dense, a bit structured and grippy in a sort of rustic and very appealing and refreshing way (the Müller-Thurgau, I assume?).

The story here is wild… and long, and convoluted, so I won’t go too far into it. But basically I went to see Matthias Wörner in March because I wanted to visit this really unknown part of northern Baden and to taste a “Klingelberger,” the local name for the Riesling that was first planted here in the late 1700s beginning, really, the fine-wine history of Baden as a whole. Yes, this was an esoteric, German-wine-dork itch I wanted to scratch, admittedly. Anyway, what I found were some of the highest-altitude vineyards in Germany (around 400 meters, or 1,300 feet) which also happen to face east, west and north – almost none face south. Matthias told me that, growing up, the other growers in the village used to laugh at how long the snow remained in their vineyards in the spring. Then he said: “They don’t laugh anymore.”

This is the only vintage I’ve tasted from Matthias, but I was honestly blown away. I expect we’ll all hear much more from this young talent. For my part, I can’t wait to go back.

2021 Hild Elbling “Zehnkommanull” – ~$23 estimated retail
This is, for us at least, a sacred bottle of wine. It is sourced from old, terraced Elbling vineyards which would have otherwise gone fallow, if it weren’t for the heart and passion and sheer force-of-will of one family, our dear Hilds. They have been making this wine since 1986, from about .15-hectare of vineyards. That’s right: point-one-five hectares, about 1,500 square meters. Thus we get, in any given year, about 30-50 cases of this wine, for the entire U.S., total.

This is less an act of winemaking, less a wine to sell, than it is a beautiful and grand gesture of cultural preservation. Working old-vine, terraced vineyards of Riesling in the middle Mosel is financially precarious; working old-vine, terraced Elbling in the upper Mosel is equal parts insane and romantic. Which sorta sums up Matthias, in the best of ways. (Check out one of the Zehnkommanull’s terraces, photographed below.)

Elbling is one of the oldest indigenous grapes of Europe, brought to the Mosel and planted by the Romans a few thousand years ago. In the late 18th century, the grape was nearly all ripped out in favor of Riesling, but a few hectares remain in a tiny, limestone-rich corner of the Mosel river, near Luxembourg and France. Think of the wine as a Muscadet of the Mosel, with its stone-riddled, floral/herbal and citrus tones. The “Zehnkommanull” (which translates to “10 point 0”) is called thus because, even bone dry, it rarely ferments to more than 10% ABV. That is the magic of old vines – phenolic ripeness without excess sugar. This is an ultra-light white, a quivering, angelic, porcelain wine with glossy, razor-sharp edges and laser-beam lemon-skin citrus. The structure, the saturating acidity, the tapering finesse and needle-point fine-ness of the wine showcase its relation to that “other” grape of the Mosel, Riesling.

If at one point Elbling was planted all through the Mosel and Rhine valleys, today it is an endangered species. It is a rarity. This tiny pocket in the upper Mosel, to my knowledge, is the last place on earth where Elbling remains in any significant quantity.

Hopefully this will change. But even if it doesn’t, you’re going to hear us shouting about this place, and these wines. While Hild’s “Zehnkommanull” is a rarity, the regular Elbling and Elbling Sekt are the benchmark wines of this region.

I love this quote from KP Keller and it sorta gets to the core of Peter Leipold’s wines: “Peter’s wines touch my heart.”