2000-12-20 Here is an portion of a web-page I found describing the visit a South African student made to my cousins home. You may view the entire page at: http://art1.candor.com/fpage/doc/wine01.htm . Look how the South African freely uses SI without any reference to FFU, except for one reference to 86 acres. Can't say if it should really be 86 ha or not. I hope you like the article. QmP = Qualit�tswein mit Predikat (Qualtity wine with attributes) QbA = Qualit�tswein beste(?)Auslese (Quality wines from the best selection). Weingut Winfried Schweisthal-Werland It was a late, wet, Sunday afternoon and I "just arrived". No appointments, totally unannounced. So un-German. I got out of the taxi and pressed the gate bell of "Winfried Schweisthal-Werland: Weingut, Weinversand, Winzermeister". To say the least, I was received with open arms . . . me, an ordinary student of the CWA from South Africa. A smiling Mr Schweisthal-Werland took me down to his cellar which still bore the scars of the recent flooding of the Rhine. We tasted Rieslings, starting with a dry-fermented 1990 QbA, working our way up to a 1990 QmP Auslese (36 g/l res sugar; 8,5 g/l acid; 8% alc). All of them were racy, elegant wines which tantalise the nose with green to ripe apples, lots of spiciness and subtle floral nuances and sometimes touches of honey from Botrytis. Even the Sp�tlese and Auslese made in the semi-sweet styles, with their high acids, were surprisingly refreshing and piquant, like drinking orange juice shortly after having just brushed your teeth! Altogether I tasted ten of his wines. The best value for money I found in the 1990 (�rziger W�rzgarten) off-dry Riesling Sp�tlese, which offered less of the peachy-pineapple character dished up by the Johannisberger, but a whole lot of spicy, floral character with such high extract levels that I couldn't believe that it was half the price. All of the estate's QmP Rieslings are of excellent quality and truly well worth the money. Mr Schweisthal-Werland only produces 15 000 litres wine per annum from his part of the W�rzgarten which stretches from the back of his house, at a 55-degree slope, straight into heaven. Because of the steep slope, all the work in the vineyard is done manually. A stainless steel ladder, which doubles as a rail for tools and harvesting baskets, makes access a bit easier. The soil of the W�rzgarten is red slate which has the ability to warm up quickly, retain heat and absorb just the required amount of water. Situated on one of the numerous bends in the Mosel and facing south, south-east, the steep vineyard enjoys excellent exposure to the sun's ripening, sugar-providing, rays. Another personal "have-to" was to taste and purchase Eiswein, that godly elixir which, sadly, remains unknown and untasted by most Germans. Mr Schweisthal-Werland couldn't help me, but he explained the route to his friend, Karl Erbes, who apparently had produced some award-winning Riesling Eisweins before. I left him a bottle of South African Noble Late Harvest, and hoped to be able to reserve one of his Mosel-facing guest rooms in the near future. back to contents Riesling-Weingut Karl Erbes The huge black door swung open and I was greeted, with caution, by Mrs Erbes. I explained my quest and was rescued by Karl Erbes from a rather awkward situation. He took me by the arm and lead me through the entrance hall into a small tasting room where we sat down and started to chat about the Cape Wine Academy and the equivalent German Wine Academy. Mr Erbes produces some 25 000 litres of wine from his share of the W�rzgarten and Treppchen vineyards (Treppchen is in Erden, a village on the other side of the Mosel) . In general he produces what he called: "A litre wine per meter of vine," referring to the total length of 25km of vines he owns. We sipped Eiswein and discussed the differences between German and South African wines. Between the two of us we drew up approximations of acid reduction / sugar development for the two countries and related them to the harvest periods, which in Germany could cover up to four or five months (Eiswein). These graphs became a source of reference and illustrated exactly why South African wine makers like Danie de Wet harvest Riesling both early and later in the season to obtain the natural levels of acidity which makes the German style so attractive. back to contents
