Thursday, Jul. 17, 2008

Riesling's dry dilemma

By Dan Berger, Wine Press Northwest

My love for Riesling should know no bounds, but alas there is a drawback that has me gnashing my teeth. Is Riesling's image that of a sweet wine?

A bit of background here. Riesling has a long track record around the world, notably because of success in Germany. It can make a wine that displays its regionality (the classic examples are the distinctive delicacy of Mosel wines and the relatively richer Rheingau styles) and it makes wines of such distinctive differences that its strongest supporters argue that it can work with a huge array of foods, including red meats.

Early in its existence as a wine in the United States, Riesling was rather sweet and carried the word Rhine. It was bottled in tall bottles (called hock), and seen as a wine for sipping. Almost no one ever served it with dinner.

And part of the reason is that it was never made dry.

Here we reach a dilemma. The most appealing new style of Riesling is relatively, if not bone, dry. And in this style the wine displays significantly wider flexibility, showing ability to pair nicely with a huge variety of foods. I have had bone dry Rielsings with seafood, chicken, salads and many different appetizers.

But can they really be sold? Is this a viable category for Americans?

Back to history: Since about the 1950s, perhaps earlier, the wine called Riesling has been made for most U.S. wine buyers as a sweet or slightly sweet wine. Despite the fact that such wines work nicely with Asian foods, notably Thai and curry dishes, the word "Riesling" means "sweet" wine to most buyers.

In the last five years or so, Riesling sales are rising. The main reason, I believe, is that the Anything But Chardonnay movement that we have all heard about finally had its impact: people seeking wines other than the same-old Chardonnay flavors. And the reason that Riesling is the new favorite of ex-Chardonnay drinkers: It is as sweet as Chardonnay (!) and it doesn't have the negative impact of oak (which is, after all, not a fruit-based aroma or taste).

All this is good news for keeping Riesling in the ground and for winemakers who love the grape and desire to make a more classic statement. Chardonnay is, after all, an easy grape to make into a simple wine, but it makes a classic only if the grapes are truly great and the winemaking impeccable.

So more people are seeking Riesling than ever, and the evidence is strong that the wine is back in a big way. Not only is Chateau Ste. Michelle and its affiliated brands able to make nearly 1 million cases of the wine (and sell it), but Bonny Doon Winery founder Randall Grahm has sunk a small fortune into his Pacific Rim Riesling in the Pacific Northwest in West Richland, Wash.

And other wineries and brands (such as Fetzer, Jekel and Blackstone) have expanded their Riesling production, and wineries like Clos du Bois have entered the picture with entries that initially have sold well.

Moreover, wineries in Oregon, New York, Michigan and Ohio all have made strides to meet the increased demand for this wine despite insufficient Riesling planted in their locales.

So what, you may ask, is the problem with this growth, other than the fact that the expansion of the category may be blunted by a lack of fruit?

It's the potentially significant niche called Dry Riesling, with the use of the capital D vitally important. Not every Riesling has to be "bone dry" to be really tart and crisp. A bit of sugar is often key to making such wines succulent while still delivering a dry finish.

But Chateau St. Michelle and others are using the term Dry Riesling on wines that are not, in my personal view, as dry as they ought to be, considering the ultra-high quality of the fruit and the winemaking they're using.

German dry Riesling, called Trocken, often contains up to 0.9% residual sugar, and these wines are often bone dry on the tongue since the acid levels are high and the pH levels very low.

But even Chateau Ste. Michelle's sensational 2007 Dry Riesling, the sweepstakes white wine at the recent Riverside International Wine Competition, is slightly sweeter than a German Trocken and sweeter than most Australian Rieslings.

The Ste. Michelle wine sells to a broad audience. But its sweetness level is likely to be a turnoff to that category of consumer who want a truly dry wine. And a key fact is that, like it or not, fine wine lovers believe any sugar in a wine

disqualifies it as a candidate for their tables.

I believe a category could well exist that is called Bone Dry Riesling, and such wines could carry up to 0.9% RS However, for now all we have at the lowest-sugar level is the term Dry Riesling. And the more wines that are released using this name that have noticeable residual sugar, the more the fine wine consumer will shy away from it.

Since making a bone-dry Riesling is risky, I see problems up ahead in the area of turning Dry Riesling into a category for fine wine lovers.

The solution may well be vineyard-designated wines that are dry enough. Yet Ste. Michelle's excellent Cold Creek Riesling is a sweeter wine.

So we remain at the same spot: a dilemma.

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