Tasted from bottle in September 2020, the 2018 Zeltinger Schlossberg Riesling Beerenauslese is another precise, elegant, intense and very salty noble sweet wine based on perfect botrytis raisins. The wine has a bright white-yellow color and opens with concentrated but refreshing lime zest and crushed slate notes intertwined with fine raisin aromas. What precision from the nose to the finish here. Attention, this is highly digestible. Tasted at the domain in September 2020.

The Selbachs’ 2007 Zeltinger Schlossberg Riesling Beerenauslese offers such high-toned and penetrating aromas of citrus with candied and distilled pit fruits that I imagined for a moment Eiswein. Thickly-rich, and suffused with musky, truffle-like, carnal, and decadently ripe fruit notes, this adds honey and white raisin as well as salt in ample measure for a complex, satisfyingly harmonious, and remarkably un-sweet finish. It should provide food for thought over the next 30-40 years. The thought crossed my mind as I began tasting Selbach’s 2007 collection “why no Pinot Blanc this year?” The Selbach crew did some pre-selection at the end of September, leading directly into a main harvest that lasted until November 10. Johannes Selbach says he often had to find things to keep his crew occupied while waiting for what he judged the optimum moments to pick. After having been through 2006, he was determined to have everything and everybody ready should circumstances suddenly dictate haste, which of course they never did. Selbach was delighted – as a self-proclaimed defender of “true Kabinett” – to have some genuinely light-weight yet intensely-flavored wines this year, and he was the first to acknowledge that not only the prevailing weather but also the abundant crop (even allowing for thinning) helped make ripe-tasting yet relatively low must-weight Riesling possible. He notes that there was relatively little botrytis, and then late. In view of that assessment, I was surprised at the extent to which this year’s Spatlesen evinced evidence of it. As for the dry and nearly-dry wines in this year’s collection, “it’s like a homecoming,” remarks Selbach, “to get back to wines with stuffing but that are sleek, anything but heavy, and inviting of the next sip.” There are a few regional importers of certain Selbach wines, but the majority (and those whose prices are noted above) are Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel (516) 677-9300.

A sense of botrytis, with light caramel, preserved citrus and glazed almond aromas and flavors. This is concentrated yet not heavy, with a vibrant underlying structure. Drink now through 2040. 100 cases made.??–BS??Region: Germany / Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Select to Add

The Selbachs’ 2006 Zeltinger Schlossberg Riesling Beerenauslese smells of resin, caramel, white raisins, and grapefruit rind, and maple syrup, with smoky, spiritous overtones. In the mouth, it is creamy and butterscotch-like, and its resinous character reveals itself as in part due to the small cask in which this was vinified. This is certainly impressively mouth coating and intensely persistent, if lacking in the lift and elegance of many of the most exciting 2006s. It will be fascinating to follow for 30 or more years, no doubt, but because like nearly every Selbach wine it is not overloaded with youthful sweetness, you could enjoy it tomorrow without pangs of conscience. The harvest almost filled the month of October, but by the standards of this large estate with holdings stretching across four communes, that is (in Johannes Selbach’s words) “super quick” and volume was down 30% from the already small 2005 harvest. Musts were sometimes fined with bentonite but never with charcoal. “This is my year of superlatives,” says Selbach. “When I think of my children and their children, and about a wine one could open in a hundred years and say ‘Wow!’ one dreams of wines from great historical vintages like 1911, 1921, 1953 ... and that in one’s own lifetime one might experience and harvest wines that would number among them. For me, that’s 2006.” Selbach took an interest in Pinot Blanc for sparkling wine, since there are some promising old vines in cooler side locations of Zeltingen’s Schlossberg. But he now thinks the fruit will probably always be too ripe for that purpose, whereas the still results are themselves promising.There are a few regional importers of certain Selbach wines, but the majority (and those whose prices are noted above) are Terry Theise Estate Selections, imported by Michael Skurnik Wines, Inc., Syosset, NY; tel (516) 677-9300