LeipoldSilvaner Schilfsandstein Trocken 2021 (750ml)

This is an estate we were introduced to by Klaus Peter Keller. Peter Leipold, the young son who is taking over the winery, simply has “the touch,” I don’t know how else to say it. Nearly every wine I’ve tasted from the estate is incredibly linear, light, incisive and penetrating yet also electric. Two words keep coming to mind: saturation and evaporation. The wines have a super-fine, glycerine density to them, yet then they are gone, weightless… only the energy reverberating. These wines are Silvaner as mineral scalpel; drink carefully.

The Schilfsandstein is sourced from a site with a very specific type of sandstone. And this is the genius of Silvaner, how sensitive it is to soil, how transparent. This wine is a completely different animal than the Gässberg – it is fuller and more floral. It isn’t heavier per se, but it feels more expansive and textural, there is more momentum and push. And this is often the profile you get when comparing limestone to sandstone: tension and cut versus an expansive power. Yet what makes Leipold’s Silvaner Schilfsandstein so good is the buoyancy and lift. This is a richer wine, yet it has so much energy and bounce – saturation and then, quickly, evaporation. Damn these wines are so good it’s silly.