Freie Weingaertner Wachau Riesling Smaragd Loibner Loibenberg

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Spiced purple plum and honeysuckle on the nose of the 2006 Riesling Smaragd Loibenberg lead to a luscious, opulent palate of brown spice-tinged and honey-glazed ripe plum. There is plenty of refreshment to be derived here and no heat from the more than 14% alcohol. A distinctive, faintly peppery mineral pungency informs the succulent, long finish of this outstanding representative of a great site. I am delighted to report that with 2006, director Roman Horvath and oenologist Heinz Frischengruber have brought the Freie Weingartner coop back to the front ranks of Austrian viticulture. Any who have followed – sometimes with frustration and sorrow – the past half dozen years in the history of this Wachau institution can only express relief, admiration, and elation. Success here is all the more important to American consumers today, inasmuch as wine from most of the top Wachau addresses is becoming unaffordable for many of us to drink on a regular basis, not to mention for restaurants to offer by the glass. If a few of the lower-level, higher-volume bottlings this year represented a slight dip in quality, that was to be expected given the nature of the vintage and the huge number of growers who supply fruit to this venture. For similar reasons, the Freie Weingartner were bound to deal with a certain amount of botrytis this year, but in the dry wines they seem to have retained only that which would confer positive spice and richness, bottling some improbably successful and refined sweet wines as an outlet for the rest.Importer: Vin Divino, Chicago, IL; tel. (773) 334-6700.