Weingut Wittman

Posted by Adam Morganstern on Mar 18, 2008 in Rheinhessen

Since 1663 the Wittmans and their ancestors have been wine farmers in the town of Westhofen, in the southern part of the Rheinhessen appellation. Over centuries this tradition was kept and led to the estate in its current form. Guenter and Elisabeth Wittmann and their son Phillipp divide the tasks running the 25 hectare estate.Riesling is the dominant grape of choice but also the Pinot varietals (Pinot Blanc, Pinot Gris) and Silvaner have a long tradition in the Westhofen. For over one decade the vineyards have been farmed organically according to ecological guidelines.Aside from the goal to maintain a healthy soil for following generations, we are convinced that this commitment to organic farming plays a significant role in the expression of the regional character, the terroir, and the finished wines.Intensive vineyard care during the whole year, low yields and rigorous hand-selection of the grapes are the basis for a high wine quality. Careful processing of the grapes and the must is the next step.Dry wines are marketed as quality wine without attributes and are classified as:- ESTATE Wines: often a blend from several vineyards of the estate, fruitfocused, elegant wines of the different varietals, ideal food companions.- “S” Wines: the grapes for these wines are specially selected from the best vineyards, wines from very ripe fruit, concentrated and significant mineral in the character, the best wines of the Silvaner and the Pinot varietals are in this category.- GREAT GROWTH*: harvested from the “Grand Cru” vineyards of Westhofen, these are Riesling wines with very individual character, mineral focused and distinguished by the limestone soil characteristics. Very concentrated, full bodied and with significant longevity.The fruity and noble-sweet wines of the estate are offered with the traditional attributes such as Spätlese, Auslese, Berrenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese.

Weingut Sander

Posted by Adam Morganstern on Mar 18, 2008 in Rheinhessen

The Sander winery was the first who started organic viticulture in the 1950’s in Germany. In those days, the family’s grandfather thought of treating the vines differently because of the erosion of soil on the slopes; chlorosis of the wines caused by insufficient soil management as well as the illness of his wife. Since then, the winery only produces wines from organic grapes. The winery, with its 50 acres of vines, is located in the Rhone valley, 70 km southwest of Frankfurt. The winery produces premium wines of local, as well as international, grape varieties. The most important grapes are Riesling, Pinot Blanc and Pinot Noir. The white wines are fermented, stored and matured in stainless steel vessels under temperature-controlled conditions. This gives us fruit driven, well-balanced wines that show the best characters of the grapes. We do not use oak on the white wines because it often dominates the fruit. We produce the red wines with a long maturation and skin contact to extract as much of the skins as we can. The grapes are treated extremely gently to not extract dry, astringent tannins. The malo fermentation and storage of the wines is in either small barrique barrels or big oak vessels so that the wines have time to gain balance and structure prior to bottling.