WINE ADVOCATE - 98-99 POINTS Aged on the full lees until June this year and to be bottled the day after I tasted it, the 2021 Hermannshohle GG offers a clear, deep, intense and complex bouquet of iodine slate aromas intertwined with lemon oil notes and those of crushed stones. Darker toned and more remote or aristocratic yet also intense and concentrated, it has a sur lie character and concentrated fruit. Full-bodied, dense, yet crystalline and saline on the palate, this is a powerful, rich and persistent Hermannshohle with a long, complex and aromatic finish with fine tannins and stimulating lemon bitters. Still with rougher grip, this is an intense and lush, still dismissive Hermannshohle. 13% stated alcohol. Natural cork. Tasted at the domaine in July 2022. Stephan Reinhardt.
2021 is, after a long time, once again a classic vintage, something Cornelius Donnhoff has not had in this century, but for his father Helmut, a harvest in late October and November was still common. The harvest at Dönnhoff was a good two or three weeks later than in recent years, after there had been no hot spells but frequent showers without thunderstorms. Peronospora was the challenge of the vintage. It required meticulous crop protection as well as foliar work to keep the foliage wall airy and healthy. Without such, as well as a late harvest, physiological ripeness would not have been achievable in 2021. The harvest began in the last week of September and lasted until the second week of November, when the nights had long since returned to a sensitive cool. Must weights were low, but the grapes were still ripe, even though acids were very high. Dönnhoff maintains a large team and was able to harvest at the right time in every site. Since there was virtually no botrytis in the middle Nahe, it was not possible to select any Beerenauslesen and Trockenbeerenauslesen here, just Eiswein.
The musts were cool due to the cold nights and could be processed without haste.
That the 2021s also managed without residual sugar to balance the high acidity (10 grams per liter) is something no one would have thought at the beginning of harvest, even at Donnhoff. But since it was partly precipitated as tartar, the wines are riper and rounder on the palate than was thought in the fall. In order to buffer the acidity naturally (with potassium and calcium), the musts were left on the extract-rich grapes longer than usual. The tartaric acid thus found binding partners and could partially precipitate, if the wine was given enough time.
The results of the vintage are outstanding, especially with Donnhoff, especially with the Grosses Gewachs and the Auslese category. I caught the GG from the Dellchen at the perfect moment at the end of July, but the wine still tasted great to me four weeks later in Wiesbaden. Stephan Reinhardt, Wine Advocate.
JAMES SUCKLING - 98 POINTS Power, complexity and brilliance make this a truly remarkable dry riesling, the touch of creaminess from long sur-lie maturation giving this exactly the soft touch it needs to balance the steely minerality that powers it at the imposing yet totally vibrant finish. From organically grown grapes with Fair'n Green certification. Drink or hold. Stuart Pigott.
2021 is, after a long time, once again a classic vintage, something Cornelius Donnhoff has not had in this century, but for his father Helmut, a harvest in late October and November was still common. The harvest at Dönnhoff was a good two or three weeks later than in recent years, after there had been no hot spells but frequent showers without thunderstorms. Peronospora was the challenge of the vintage. It required meticulous crop protection as well as foliar work to keep the foliage wall airy and healthy. Without such, as well as a late harvest, physiological ripeness would not have been achievable in 2021. The harvest began in the last week of September and lasted until the second week of November, when the nights had long since returned to a sensitive cool. Must weights were low, but the grapes were still ripe, even though acids were very high. Dönnhoff maintains a large team and was able to harvest at the right time in every site. Since there was virtually no botrytis in the middle Nahe, it was not possible to select any Beerenauslesen and Trockenbeerenauslesen here, just Eiswein.
The musts were cool due to the cold nights and could be processed without haste.
That the 2021s also managed without residual sugar to balance the high acidity (10 grams per liter) is something no one would have thought at the beginning of harvest, even at Donnhoff. But since it was partly precipitated as tartar, the wines are riper and rounder on the palate than was thought in the fall. In order to buffer the acidity naturally (with potassium and calcium), the musts were left on the extract-rich grapes longer than usual. The tartaric acid thus found binding partners and could partially precipitate, if the wine was given enough time.
The results of the vintage are outstanding, especially with Donnhoff, especially with the Grosses Gewachs and the Auslese category. I caught the GG from the Dellchen at the perfect moment at the end of July, but the wine still tasted great to me four weeks later in Wiesbaden. Stephan Reinhardt, Wine Advocate.
JAMES SUCKLING - 98 POINTS Power, complexity and brilliance make this a truly remarkable dry riesling, the touch of creaminess from long sur-lie maturation giving this exactly the soft touch it needs to balance the steely minerality that powers it at the imposing yet totally vibrant finish. From organically grown grapes with Fair'n Green certification. Drink or hold. Stuart Pigott.
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