Keller: Spätburgunder Nieder-Flörsheimer Frauenberg Großes Gewächs 2016

Galloni über: Spätburgunder Nieder-Flörsheimer Frauenberg Großes Gewächs

-- Galloni: Red and black currants are accented by coriander seed and marine mineral notes on the nose. Purity and tenderness of fruit reign midpalate, along with a subtle but seductively silken texture, yet without sacrificing bright, invigoratingly seed-tinged juiciness. Bittersweet iris and gentian perfume adds to the wine’s alluring complexity. The impressively sustained finish delivers striking purity of fruit, lift, perfume and a salinity that activates the salivary glands. With the tiny clusters and berries he gets from this vineyard’s sélection massale vines, Keller has long tended to include a significant share of stems and intact berries in the ferment, an approach that no doubt helps account for – or, at least, reinforce – the floral notes found in his Frauenberg bottlings. Recently, he and his team have begun surgically removing the center stem from each cluster, leaving only the delicately branching stems that connect the berries. This, he opined, enhances the positive aromatic effects of stems as well as the slow release of juice that prolongs fermentation and retards alcoholic conversion. (A portion of the clusters is also being handled this way with Keller’s two other Pinot Noirs, and even with a few vintage 2017 white wines.) 93/100