WINE OF THE WEEK: Weingut Vollenweider Wolfer Goldgrube Riesling Kabinett 2023, Mosel, Germany

£22.31, Ripley Wines

Wine drinkers almost everywhere have been switching from red wines to white (I don't even need to mention rosé). And we’ve been moving to lighter, crisper styles, away from white wines thick with oak.

We've also been turning to wines with lower alcohol – a switch that’s not just driven by the pro rata duty rates that make higher alcohol wines more expensive.

And we’re often drinking slightly sweeter wines than we were, because growing numbers of 'dry' wines have more residual sugar than they used to, which means that these wines, red as well as white, are off-dry or even medium dry – and people are enjoying them.

So why aren’t we drinking more German Rieslings, especially in the racy, lacy Kabinett style from the Mosel and especially in spring and summer when these diaphanous, fruity wines refresh parts other wines can’t reach? They couldn't be more suited to the heat and sunshine we're promised for the Bank Holiday.

Mosel Kabinetts are usually only 7–8% alcohol, naturally so, and they’re often medium dry and can be even sweeter. But they don’t taste it because the sweetness is balanced by high acidity and their fruitiness is woven through with flinty, rock-pool minerality.

This Wolfer Goldgruber Riesling 2023 from Weingut Vollenweider is a wonderful example (one of four I tried and highly recommend from Ripley Wines).

Its mouthwatering flinty-smoky aromas turn into the smoothness of river-washed pebbles on the palate and the smokiness meets fresh green herb, spicy green fruit and crystalline acidity.

It’s the first organically certified vintage of the wine, which comes from the coolest part of the almost impossibly steep, rocky Goldgrube vineyard, and in its grey-and-red slate soils there are ungrafted vines of more than 80 years old.

This is a magical aperitif (and will still be in eight years' time, so buy plenty), but you can also drink it with spring vegetable dishes such as risi e bisi and with Cantonese and spicier South East Asian cuisines, including Thai green curry and Szechuan dishes, as long as they're not too mouth numbingly hot. 8%. Empty bottle weight: 436g.

Weingut Vollenweider Wolfer Goldgrube Riesling Kabinett 2023, Mosel, Germany

£22.31, Ripley Wines

#wine #Germany #Riesling #wineandfood #winepairing #aperitif #white