Peach, musk melon, persimmon, and honey inform the 2006 Wolfer Goldgrube Riesling Spatlese (A.P. #2) a wine with a doughy, creamy mouth-feel and sense of substantially and richness more appropriate to an Auslese, yet light and wafting. The sweet, soothing, yet somehow refreshing vanilla cream and peach character with a hint of offsetting bitter peach kernel in the finish reminds me of 1975. This should evolve nicely for at least 15 years. “We started picking immediately after the October 3rd rain, and then under high pressure,” relates Daniel Vollenweider. Already then, there was little to be harvested below Auslese, not surprising considering the general trends this vintage and the fact that Vollenweider, as a friend to botryits in normal times, never sprays to keep it at bay. But in a departure from the norm, one cask had reached ten grams of residual sugar by the end of last summer and Vollenweider decided he might as well taste what a truly dry Wolfer Goldgrube Spatlese would be like! (I have not connected with the bottled wine.) A second major vineyard reclamation project in the Schimbock – a once-renowed riverside parcel within today’s Trabener Wurzgarten – is where Vollenweider intends to specialize in dry Riesling. Importer: Vineyard Research, Inc., Lunenburg, MA tel. 617 686 8052; Ewald Moseler Selections, Portland OR tel. 888 274 4312; also A Bill Mayer Age of Riesling Selection Imported by Valley View Wine Sales, Glen Ellen, CA; tel. (510) 549-2444