Wine-expert authors indulge themselves in superlatives. The Englishman Hugh Johnson speaks of the " best of all cultivation area on the Rhine ". And in Frank Schoonmaker "wine encyclopedia" one says: " According to opinion of many experts the most significant wine-growing area of the world ". The speech is from the Rhine region which belongs with a vine agricultueral land of only about 3,000 hectares to one of the smallest cultivation areas of Germany.
Looked geographically is the Rheingau region a 38 kilometers long and two to three kilometer wide stripe on the Rhine which applies from the Main mouth with Wicker up to Lorchhausen . The wine-growing finds here ideal climatic conditions which were already recognized many hundred years ago by wine-growing-propelling cloister brothers. The in this region almost good as sea wide Rhine provides with his water surface for a reflection of the solar radiation. In the hinterland the forests of the Taunusgebirge protect against cold north hoists. The average climate worth of the Rheingau region guarantee an excellent growth of the vines: 9.9'C middle annual temperature, 1643 solar hours and only 536 mms of annual precipitation.
Adding there comes a noteworthy variety of the grounds with slate, quartzite, sandstones, gravels and loess which contributes to the wealth of nuances of the Rheingauer wines. To the Rheingauer winegrowers one can attest that they have a high education state. Thus almost every independent wine producer has a finished education as a winegrower's assistant, winegrower's master or wine-growing engineer in the Rheingau. These are winegrowers who protect necessary traditions (what becomes apparent above all in the retention of the classical type of grapes Riesling and late Burgundian), which also do not close mind to the progress in the cellar economy.
Besides, is meritoriously the far above-average ecological consciousness the Rheingauer wine producer
All together there are about 380 wine-growing companies. With most it concerns family enterprise with vine agricultueral land from four to eight hectares. In addition, there are three local cooperatives and about two dozens bigger wine goods (vine agricultueral land between 10 and about 50 hectares) which are involved partly strongly in the export and thereby announced the good call of the Rheingauer Riesling worldwide.
The wine-growing in the Rheingau has a history which can be traced back till the Roman time. However, only the archbishops of Mainz provided for an expansion on the today's size between the 10th and 14th century. The church dignitaries promoted the clearing of the forests along the Rhine to put on vineyards. The Rheingau became the farm land with civil rights, and a saying did round: " Rheingauer air makes free ".
The numerous cloisters and nobility families were involved in the removal of the wine economy likewise exemplarily. They showed an absolute high-class striving and an exemplary interest in the development of new and better methods in the wine-growing, cellar economy and marketing.
All German wine predicates have her origin in the Rheingau and found only for wines of special goodness use. Thus one already knew more than 250 years ago the concept "Cabinet" for the precious plants of good volumes which were kept in "Cabinet" cellars. The late vintage wine, selection and her better variants wines of selected grapes and dry wine of selected grapes were likewise discovered in the Rheingau. They are looked here still as specialities which cannot grow every year and not in rough amounts.
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The Rheingau can show the first report for the cultivation of "seczreben riesslingen"; it dates from the year 1435. Since then the kind was especially maintained in this small area on the Rhine. Today the Rheingau with 84 percent of the vine agricultueral land disposes of the highest Riesling interest of all wine-growing areas of the world.
Other types of grapes would bring here absolutely more yield; but they had never been able to assert themselves in the Rheingau properly. In the end, the Riesling counts by his fine race and elegance, by his typical Bouquet with tender peach smell and his striking, lively acid as the maybe best of all white wine kind of the world. Here, in the northern wine-growing region possibly at the height of 50° of latitude, the Riesling finds the ideal ground and climate relations. Here he can mature long and take up many mineral materials from the ground in this time which are important conditions for fruit and salary of the wine.
The vintage begins in the Rhine region rarely before the 15th October; often she is still late in November in the way. Importantly for the maturity of the Riesling is a warm autumn which provides for the necessary sugar education in the grapes. A specific feature can be, on this occasion, the infestation of the grapes by the mushroom Botrytis Cinerea. If the infestation happens, as desired, with ripe grapes, water and it evaporates the other contents materials of the grapes concentrate, so that from the reading good high-quality predicate wines can be won.
But also without this "noble decay" Rheingauer Riesling knows by his cleans to arouse enthusiasm racy and frutiy kind. The wines have a lot of extract materials. Their alcohol interest is not very high mostly (between 9 and 11.5% vol.). Especially the quality-tested wines and cabinet wine with her striking kind and stimulating ease in the dry and medium dry version are preferred more and more often than companion to food.
What the Riesling for the white wine kinds, is the blue Spätburgunder for the red wine kinds! In France the kind Pinot noir is called. In the Rhine region the Spätburgunder a real speciality, tilled on about 160 hectares, is preferred in the precipitous positions by Assmannshausen. The Spätburgunder was mentioned in Germany first in 1318; Cistercian's monks of Eberbach presumably brought him in the Rheingau, where his cultivation 1470 is covered documentary. In the "regular seat" Assmannshausen this "red vine" grows since at least 1507. " He stands in high value, has even before the Burgundian to red wines the highest degree of strength " a wine brisk wrote in 1829. Indeed, the Rheingauer Spätburgunder belongs certainly to the best of all red wines of Germany, but he is lighter, softer, more velvety than the full wines rich in alcohol and rich in body from France.
From the small beeries, full-ripeed, deep-blue grapes originate color-brighter wines with a discreet, tender-spicy aroma and elegant, warm kind with a pleasant acid, which provides at the same time for the fact that the wines remain capable of camp. With the years the wine can increase his fire restrained at first and coin the flavorful nuances. He is also isolated as a refreshing rose full of salary developed. The finesse of the Rheingauer Spätburgunder also has a cause in the relatively low yields.
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