While just popping into Sam's in search of a wine to grab and pop for
a very casual dinner with a non-wine-geek friend that we organized at
the eleventh hour, I noticed a lone bottle of Von Hovel
Scharzhofberger Riesling Auslese 2005 in a bin marked down to $14.
Easy, easy buy.

Opened that half an hour later with some good Cuban food (pork,
grilled chicken, fried plantains and empenadas). Light yellow in
colour with an elegant, complex nose showing sweet pears, peaches,
apple and mineral flavours. Medium bodied on the palate with a creamy
texture and flavours of peaches, pears, fruit tart and chalky minerals
over moderate acidity. This is rather sweet in the mouth but well
balanced, and the richness of this went very well with the pork and
well spiced Cuban fare. A huge thumbs up, particularly at the price.

Cheers,

Salil

On May 14, 12:17 am, Salil > wrote:
> While just popping into Sam's in search of a wine to grab and pop for
> a very casual dinner with a non-wine-geek friend that we organized at
> the eleventh hour, I noticed a lone bottle of Von Hovel
> Scharzhofberger Riesling Auslese 2005 in a bin marked down to $14.
> Easy, easy buy.
>
> Opened that half an hour later with some good Cuban food (pork,
> grilled chicken, fried plantains and empenadas). Light yellow in
> colour with an elegant, complex nose showing sweet pears, peaches,
> apple and mineral flavours. Medium bodied on the palate with a creamy
> texture and flavours of peaches, pears, fruit tart and chalky minerals
> over moderate acidity. This is rather sweet in the mouth but well
> balanced, and the richness of this went very well with the pork and
> well spiced Cuban fare. A huge thumbs up, particularly at the price.

I still have some of the 1976 Scharzhofberger von Hovel auslese as
well as the 1976 auslese from Egon Muller. Of course the Muller
usually is quite a bit more expensive, but the von Hovel often is a
very good buy and often of high quality. On the average, the Muller
wines seem to be more classic and respond better to long age than the
von Hovel for auslese and above grades especially. However if you
drink the wine from a very good year before about 10 years old, you
miss a lot in auslese and above grades. For spatlese and kabinett,
some like them young and perhaps the von Hovel may often be more
drinkable young than the Muller that often can take long age in these
grades. Other producers of Scharzhofberger that I have had are Hohe
Domkirche and Koch. They can be good and usually cost much less than
the Muller. It has been many years since I bought any of these. One of
the most unusual wines from Scharzhofberger is a Fiene Auslese
Nikolauswein 1970 from Koch. I still have a little and it is holding.
The "fiene"(best grade) and "Nikolauswein" (grapes picked on a German
holiday in December" can no longer be used on German wine labels since
the 1971 wine law revisions.

On May 14, 3:24 am, cwdjrxyz > wrote:
> On May 14, 12:17 am, Salil > wrote:
>
> > While just popping into Sam's in search of a wine to grab and pop for
> > a very casual dinner with a non-wine-geek friend that we organized at
> > the eleventh hour, I noticed a lone bottle of Von Hovel
> > Scharzhofberger Riesling Auslese 2005 in a bin marked down to $14.
> > Easy, easy buy.
>
> > Opened that half an hour later with some good Cuban food (pork,
> > grilled chicken, fried plantains and empenadas). Light yellow in
> > colour with an elegant, complex nose showing sweet pears, peaches,
> > apple and mineral flavours. Medium bodied on the palate with a creamy
> > texture and flavours of peaches, pears, fruit tart and chalky minerals
> > over moderate acidity. This is rather sweet in the mouth but well
> > balanced, and the richness of this went very well with the pork and
> > well spiced Cuban fare. A huge thumbs up, particularly at the price.
>
> I still have some of the 1976 Scharzhofberger von Hovel auslese as
> well as the 1976 auslese from Egon Muller. Of course the Muller
> usually is quite a bit more expensive, but the von Hovel often is a
> very good buy and often of high quality. On the average, the Muller
> wines seem to be more classic and respond better to long age than the
> von Hovel for auslese and above grades especially. However if you
> drink the wine from a very good year before about 10 years old, you
> miss a lot in auslese and above grades. For spatlese and kabinett,
> some like them young and perhaps the von Hovel may often be more
> drinkable young than the Muller that often can take long age in these
> grades. Other producers of Scharzhofberger that I have had are Hohe
> Domkirche and Koch. They can be good and usually cost much less than
> the Muller. It has been many years since I bought any of these. One of
> the most unusual wines from Scharzhofberger is a Fiene Auslese
> Nikolauswein 1970 from Koch. I still have a little and it is holding.
> The "fiene"(best grade) and "Nikolauswein" (grapes picked on a German
> holiday in December" can no longer be used on German wine labels since
> the 1971 wine law revisions.

Actually it is more accurate to say "feine" translates to fine or
perhaps selected and "feinste" is a still higher grade that might
translate as best. Although it is illegal to use these terms on labels
since 1971, there is a way around this that is not illegal. For
instance, Muller makes many batches of wine. The better ones have a
gold capsule, and the best have a long gold capsule. Schloss
Johannisberg has used two label designs. The normal one is the coat-of-
arms one. The label for the better wines shows a picture of the
Schloss instead. Others have used various systems of colors and bands
on capsules to mark their better wines - all of this now is quite
unofficial of course - you have to be in the know to use it. However
each batch of wine sold since 1971 must have a different A.P. number
on the label. A few people find out which AP number is associated with
the best wine. If a reviewer does not give the AP number for a higher
grade of German wine, there is no way of knowing if the description of
the wine given corresponds to the wine you buy.

The more rare wines from Egon Muller can be very costly indeed. For
instance his Scharzhofberger Eiswein 1983 sold for over US$ 700 per
bottle in many cases when a little came on the US market shortly after
release. This, at the time, was up there with the cost of the better
wines from DRC.

"cwdjrxyz" > skrev i melding
...
>>
> Actually it is more accurate to say "feine" translates to fine or
> perhaps selected and "feinste" is a still higher grade that might
> translate as best.
The "ei" in German is pronounced exactly like the English "i" in fine.
"Feinste" thus is "finest", of course :-)
Another difference is that the final "e" is audible and now you can
pronounce German quite correctly!
Anders

Salil wrote:
> While just popping into Sam's in search of a wine to grab and pop for
> a very casual dinner with a non-wine-geek friend that we organized at
> the eleventh hour, I noticed a lone bottle of Von Hovel
> Scharzhofberger Riesling Auslese 2005 in a bin marked down to $14.
> Easy, easy buy.

You dog! When I was there a few weeks ago, the German and Austrian
wines were lumped together on 4 shelves just inside the store against
the wall. Was this bottle there, or elsewhere? I was quite
underwhelmed with their selection of German and Austrian wines, BTW.

Mark Lipton