2009 Peter Lauer “Senior”Ayler Kupp Riesling Faß 6

2009 Peter Lauer "Senior"Ayler Kupp Riesling Faß 6

This wine is smokingly good…..

We had a look at the estates  Faß 16 a few weeks back and this particular wine cranks up the richness and minerality to Spinal Tap levels of intensity.

Florian Lauer is now at the helm of the family estate….a 7.5ha domaine on the Saar River in the commune of Ayl. This particular wine comes from various plots, some with vines up to 90 years of age in the Westerly section of the “original” Ayler Kupp vineyard near the village of Biebelhausen. The “Senior”comes from a variety of parcels withing the pink-shaded Neuanlage section of Ayler Kupp on the map below that I nicked from the fine folks at Mosel wine Blog.

The “Senior” is named in honour of the style which Florian’s Grandfather favoured….rich, concentrated and teetering on the brink of off-dry. Cool fruit, gently , whole bunch pressed, some contact with the pomace, wild yeast ferments and aging sur lie in a combination of old oak and stainless steel tank.

Pale medium straw in the glass with aromas of rich, concentrated white peach fruit with a touch of juicy lime. The are hints of almond blossom, deeply etched minerals and slate, soft spice, apple, straw, tarragon, flinty smoke and leesy lemon curd nuances.

In the mouth it is concentrated and elegant hovering somewhere between trocken and feinherb in style….just off dry, textured…showing great tension & harmony. The fruit characters sit in the juicy white peach, stone fruit and zesty lime spectrum with hints of crunchy ripe red apple. The is a solid backdrop of slate and minerals studded with pear, soft spice, bay leaf and flint.

Great intensity on the palate with excellent tension between the fruit and acidity….very focused, luscious and precise with a not quite dry, mesmerising, long finish…..very moreish, elegant drinking.

Let’s briefly talk about the A.P. Number on German wine labels while we are here also….the A.P. stands for Amtliche Prüfnummer and it’s kind of like a German wines IP address to put it in internet geeky terms….it basically is a quality control number, which indicates that the wine passed several official tests required for QbA and Prädikatswein. On this particular bottle it looks something like this – 3501074/06/10.

The 3 indicates the region of production (in this case the Saar), 501 is the village (Ayler Kupp, in the recent Steinmetz wine 577 denotes the Brauneberger Juffer village), 074 is the estate and is the unique number for  Weingut Peter Lauer, 06 is the bottling number….the sixth sample submitted, which in this case looks like it corresponds to the Faß 6 or Fuder number at the estate and finally 10 is the year that the wine was officially tasted…..so there you go….astound your friends, confound your enemies and confuse yourselves….

Price: $35 – Closure: Cork – Alcohol: 12% – Source: Cellar – Importer: Andrew Guard Fine Wines

Ayler Kupp map