Ostertag’s 2006 Riesling Fronholz smells complexly of apricot, plum distillate, sage, resin, mushroom, sea breeze, and fruit pit, with a correspondingly multi-faceted, pungent and subtly bitter palate impression. Like a few others among the best wines of its vintage, this offers healthy juiciness and genuine refreshment if not enormous sheer ripeness. Its subtle finishing savor is like an echo of the intense brininess and pungency delivered by the 2007. Out of caution, I would plan to enjoy it over the next 3-4 years, but it might well prove to have more stamina. Andre Ostertag was like most of his region’s best growers very selective about what he chose to bottle in 2006. He is especially enthusiastic about his uncompromisingly intense 2007s and the sense in which the Rieslings resemble a throwback to the moderate must weights and refreshing acidity that was common in Alsace before the string of warm vintages that has been nearly uninterrupted since 1988. I was surprised to find myself as impresses as I was with the 2007 Pinot Gris bottlings here, but Ostertag says it was simply unfair until very recently to compare his results with that grape to those with Riesling, because the vines of the former were too young. They’ve passed 20 years of age now, and that, he opines, is why they can start to show their real potential (and, I would add, stand up to Ostertag’s use of barriques). While I hate to take up space with this matter, readers should be aware that wines from this estate that formerly bore the village name “Epfig” will now merely be coded with the capital letter “E” because of certain limitations that the authorities have now imposed on the use of village designates and the definition of “village level” names. (Frankly, I wouldn’t even want to understand the regulation if I thought it would prove intelligible!)Importer: Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant, Berkeley, CA; tel. (510) 524-1524
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