Weingut Emmerich Knoll, Ried Loibenberg Riesling Smaragd, 2015

Weingut Emmerich Knoll, Ried Loibenberg Riesling Smaragd, 2015

  • icon-type Type

    White

  • icon-year Year

    2015

  • icon-style Style

    Dry

  • icon-country Country

    Austria

  • icon-alcohollevel Alcohol level

    13.5%

  • icon-grapevariety Grape variety
    Riesling 100%

A fresh, fruity and sustainable wine, yellow with very fine green reflections and a quite strong bouquet of apple, pear and quince as well as a little peach, citrus and exotic fruits (lychee, mango).

On the opening it is slightly sweet, fresh and well structured, soft, harmonious and round, again with nice minerality, present fruit notes and a hint of linden blossom, nutmeg and grass as well as a pleasant long finish - takes a lot of time, with enormous potential.

The bottle has a slightly protruding cork.

A lesser known detail...

The arguably most famous wine label in Austria – the family’s trademark baroque image of Saint Urban, patron saint of vineyards and winemakers – first graced the Knoll wine bottles in 1962.

About Weingut Emmerich Knoll

Weingut Emmerich Knoll is one of Austria's most well-known wine producers. The Knoll estate is located in the Wachau region, in the village of Unterloiben. It was established in 1825 and is still family-owned and -operated. Knoll is best known for its age-worthy, expressive Riesling and Grüner Veltliner wines from unique sites on the northern bank of the Danube.

The estate covers 14 hectares (35 acres) on highly regarded sites including the Schütt, Loibenberg, Kellerberg, Kreutles and Pfaffenberg vineyards. These sites are planted to 45 percent Riesling and 45 percent Grüner Veltliner, with the remainder planted to Chardonnay, Yellow Muscat, Rivaner, Blauer Burgunder and Gelber Traminer. Soil types vary from site to site but are primarily composed of loess, loam, granite, and gneiss top soils.

Emmerich Knoll is a member of the Vinea Wachau Nobilis Districtus and follows the association's strict quality control regulations and three tier system, producing Steinfeder, Federspiel and Smaragd level wines. Some of the estate's top wines include the Kellerberg Riesling Smaragd, Loibenberg Grüner Veltliner Smaragd, and Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese wines that are made only in vintages conductive to the development of botrytis.

The estate handpicks the grapes at specific ripeness and must weights, blocks malolactic fermentation for freshness, and uses large oak fourdres almost exclusively for an oxidative winemaking process.

Grape variety
Riesling

Riesling is a white grape variety which originated in the Rhine region. Riesling is an aromatic grape variety displaying flowery, almost perfumed, aromas as well as high acidity. It is used to make dry, semi-sweet, sweet, and sparkling white wines. Riesling wines are usually varietally pure and are seldom oaked. As of 2004, Riesling was estimated to be the world's 20th most grown variety at 48,700 hectares (120,000 acres) (with an increasing trend), but in terms of importance for quality wines, it is usually included in the "top three" white wine varieties together with Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. Riesling is a variety which is highly "terroir-expressive", meaning that the character of Riesling wines is greatly influenced by the wine's place of origin.

In cool climates (such as many German wine regions), Riesling wines tend to exhibit apple and tree fruit notes with noticeable levels of acidity that are sometimes balanced with residual sugar. A late-ripening variety that can develop more citrus and peach notes is grown in warmer climates (such as Alsace and parts of Austria). In Australia, Riesling is often noted for a characteristic lime note that tends to emerge in examples from the Clare Valley and Eden Valley in South Australia. Riesling's naturally high acidity and pronounced fruit flavours give wines made from the grape exceptional aging potential, with well-made examples from favourable vintages often developing smoky, honey notes, and aged German Rieslings, in particular, taking on a "petrol" character.

In wine making, the delicate nature of the Riesling grape requires special handling during harvesting to avoid crushing or bruising the skin. Without this care, the broken skins could leak tannin into the juice, giving a markedly coarse taste and throwing off balance the Riesling's range of flavours and aromas.

A wine that is best at its "freshest" states, the grapes and juice may be chilled often throughout the vinification process. Once, right after picking to preserve the grapes' more delicate flavours. Second, after it has been processed through a bladder press and right before fermentation. During fermentation, the wine is cooled in temperature controlled stainless steel fermentation tanks kept between 10 and 18 °C (50 and 64 °F). This differs from red wines that normally ferment at 24 to 29 °C (75 to 84 °F)

Unlike Chardonnay, most Riesling do not undergo malolactic fermentation. This helps preserve the tart, acidic characteristic of the wine that gives Riesling its "thirst-quenching" quality. (Producers of Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Grigio often avoid malolactic fermentation for the same reason.) Riesling is often put through a process of cold stabilisation, where the wine is stored just above its freezing point. The wine is kept at this temperature until much of the tartaric acid has crystallised and precipitated out of the wine. This helps prevent crystallisation of the acid (often called "wine diamonds") in the bottle. After this, the wine is normally filtered again to remove any remaining yeast or impurities.

In viticulture, the two main components in growing Riesling grapes are to keep it "Long & Low" meaning that the ideal situation for Riesling is a climate that allows for a long, slow ripening and proper pruning to keep the yield low and the flavour concentrated.

Alternative Names: Weisser Riesling, Johannisberg Riesling, Johannisberger, Rhine Riesling, Riesling Renano

About Wachau

Wachau is a small but important wine district on the Danube River in northern Austria. It follows the Danube for roughly 20 miles (33km) until Krems-an-der-Donau, the fifth-largest city in Lower Austria and the commercial hub for Wachau and its neighbouring districts Kremstal and Kamptal. One of Austria's most famous and respected wine regions, Wachau is known for its full-bodied, pepper-tinged Grüner Veltliner and rich, steely Riesling.

Most Wachau vineyards are located on steep (often terraced) hillsides above the Danube – a naturally sunny location where warm summer temperatures are stabilized slightly by the river below. The most flavourful Wachau wines come from vineyards perched on sun-drenched, south-facing terraces.

Wachau's steep, sweeping, vineyard-lined riverbanks could easily be mistaken for those of Germany's Mosel, even if the wines could not: classic Wachau Rieslings taste richer, riper and more tropical than their counterparts from the cooler, wetter Mosel. They have much more in common with the richest Rieslings of Alsace and Pfalz.

Wachau Grüner Veltliner is arguably the most iconic of all Austrian wine styles in the modern day. Racy, aromatic and intense, these wines are marked by zesty citrus notes and a chlorophyll-tinged zing of white pepper. Neighbouring Kremstal and Kamptal are the only other regions on Earth capable of producing Grüner Veltliner like this.

Wachau lies outside of Austria's DAC classifications: instead, the terms Steinfeder, Federspiel and Smaragd are commonly found on bottles of white Wachau wine. This three-tier wine-style classification was developed by the region's producers as a way of communicating the style of their wines, beyond region and grape variety. Steinfeder wines are the lightest: fresh and tangy, with a maximum of 11.5% ABV. The term means "stone feather", and is the name of a wispy, feather-like grass that grows on Wachau's stony terraces. Federspiel wines are the middleweight category (11.5–12.5% ABV), with the racy, precise, elegance of a hunting falcon; federspiel means "falconry". Smaragd wines are the richest and fullest-bodied, with a minimum of 12% ABV. Smaragd translates literally as "emerald" but refers here to a distinctive, emerald-green lizard which basks on the warmest of Wachau's sun-baked stone terraces.

Top-end Wachau Smaragd wines can improve in the cellar for 20 years or more. Sought-after examples of these wines include F.X. Pichler's "Unendlich" Riesling, and both the "Singerriedel" Riesling and "Honivogl" Grüner Veltliner from Franz Hirtzberger. Among the region's top Federspiel wines are Domane Wachau's Terrassen Riesling Federspiel and Emmerich Knoll's Grüner Veltliner Federspiel.

The climate in Wachau, and indeed all of northern Austria, is influenced by two dramatically different climatological zones: the chilly Eastern Alps to the west, and the warm Pannonian Plain that dominates Hungary to the east. Overall, the Austrian climate is decidedly continental, with warm summers and cold winters, but along the banks of the Danube a more moderate mesoclimate prevails.

Soil types play an important role in Wachau vineyards. They are composed largely of sand, gravel and loess, carried downstream by the Danube over many millennia. Also present is a special kind of gneiss known as gfohler, which is said to bring a certain minerality to Wachau wines. Riesling performs best in the weathered, granitic soils on the steeper terraces, while Grüner Veltliner prefers the sandier loess carried by prevailing winds over time to eastern hillsides.

Viticulture in Wachau is thought to have been introduced by Celtic tribes and continued in the 1st Century B.C. by Romans. The most important influence, however, came from Bavarian and Salzburger monks who built the steep, terraced vineyards along the riverside in the Middle Ages.

Regular price $158.00

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