Recently enjoyed an excellent Judith Beck – Beck Ink, and desperate to find some more. Jealous!
elijha
Just got back from a few days in Burgenland, Austria and visited a few natural winemakers: Heinrich, Claus Preisinger, Judith Beck, and Renner/Rennasistas (also a bonus visit to Gut Oggau’s heuriger). It was a great experience and everyone we met was wonderful. This was my first time doing a tasting trip and I highly recommend it. Some impressions of the winemakers and the wines we tasted:
**Heinrich** was the only one whose stuff I hadn’t actually tasted before visiting. I was really surprised by how huge their production is in comparison to the others. We had a great tour of the winery there, although honestly I wasn’t *dazzled* by their wines. The Freyheit series were definitely the standouts, but overall I’d call their stuff good but not great.
**Claus Preisinger** is one of, if not my favorite winemaker, so I was really excited for this one. We rushed through the tour part a bit, but the tasting was wonderful. One of the highlights was definitely getting a sneak peek at Fruit Loops, which is a brand new wine that had just been bottled the day before we visited. The white version was still a bit raw on the nose, but quite nice and (go figure) fruity. I managed to score a bottle to take home, so I’m excited to see how it fares in a few weeks or months. The other standout star of this visit was the Grüner Vetliner Erdeluft Grasundreben. Just an exquisite, super zippy white, but unfortunately they were sold out of it.
**Judith Beck** easily had the value-priced winner of the week with her Pink rosé. Only 10€ and phenomenal acidity and green apple notes. On the other end of her cost spectrum, I also picked up her Judith red, which as you can probably guess is kind of her private reserve. A very nice example of a more “serious” red from this region with lots of complexity but no shortcomings in terms of drinkability either.
**Rennasisters** was an absolute highlight. Stefanie Renner herself hosted us and could not have been more lovely. Renner is a bit unique these days in that they’re really staying focused on plots around their winery in Gols. Pretty much everyone else has been buying up a lot of land on the opposite side of Neusiedl lake given that it’s cooler over there (yay, climate change). It’ll be interesting to see how their offerings change over the years given that commitment to staying hyperlocal, but for the time being they’re putting out some really lovely stuff. Here, I took home the quaffable Waiting for Tom rosé and the very charming and smooth Panobile red from their more “serious” Renner line (originally their parents’, but now it’s all made by the younger generation).
We didn’t originally plan to go to **Gut Oggau** since it’s a bit far-flung, but after hearing that they had some of the better food in a region with uh…limited dining options, we ended up there for dinner and naturally drank some wine too. The Timotheus white and Josephine red were both stunners. Unfortunately, lots of stuff (including the elusive Winifred) was sold out even at the source.
This trip also turned me into a Zalto convert. Pretty much everyone we visited had Zaltos and damn…they’re nice. Picked some up as soon as I got home.
[deleted]
[deleted]
abuttfarting
Had the pleasure of tasting Heinrich’s Leithaberg ~~2011~~ 2013 Chardonnay recently. The first wine that I’ve tried that smelled of oatmeal and unbuttered popcorn. If the other wines of the winery are even half as interesting, they’ve made a fan of life out of me!
HipHopSomm
🔥🔥🔥🔥
FancySwanky
How do you go about planning such a trip? I’m still pretty new to the natural wine game, but have been consuming them like a crazy person since I discovered them. I have never visited a winemaker, but now I can’t help but research natural wine makers in close proximity to my destination (Europe) when planning trips. I find it hard to find information about how to visit them however. Some seem to have nothing on the internet what so ever. Others have websites describing their general philosophy, etc. I am yet to find a winemaker that has information about wine tours or shops attached to the vineyard. Do you just show up? Do you call in advance? Or do you go on pre-planned tours?
7 Comments
Recently enjoyed an excellent Judith Beck – Beck Ink, and desperate to find some more. Jealous!
Just got back from a few days in Burgenland, Austria and visited a few natural winemakers: Heinrich, Claus Preisinger, Judith Beck, and Renner/Rennasistas (also a bonus visit to Gut Oggau’s heuriger). It was a great experience and everyone we met was wonderful. This was my first time doing a tasting trip and I highly recommend it. Some impressions of the winemakers and the wines we tasted:
**Heinrich** was the only one whose stuff I hadn’t actually tasted before visiting. I was really surprised by how huge their production is in comparison to the others. We had a great tour of the winery there, although honestly I wasn’t *dazzled* by their wines. The Freyheit series were definitely the standouts, but overall I’d call their stuff good but not great.
**Claus Preisinger** is one of, if not my favorite winemaker, so I was really excited for this one. We rushed through the tour part a bit, but the tasting was wonderful. One of the highlights was definitely getting a sneak peek at Fruit Loops, which is a brand new wine that had just been bottled the day before we visited. The white version was still a bit raw on the nose, but quite nice and (go figure) fruity. I managed to score a bottle to take home, so I’m excited to see how it fares in a few weeks or months. The other standout star of this visit was the Grüner Vetliner Erdeluft Grasundreben. Just an exquisite, super zippy white, but unfortunately they were sold out of it.
**Judith Beck** easily had the value-priced winner of the week with her Pink rosé. Only 10€ and phenomenal acidity and green apple notes. On the other end of her cost spectrum, I also picked up her Judith red, which as you can probably guess is kind of her private reserve. A very nice example of a more “serious” red from this region with lots of complexity but no shortcomings in terms of drinkability either.
**Rennasisters** was an absolute highlight. Stefanie Renner herself hosted us and could not have been more lovely. Renner is a bit unique these days in that they’re really staying focused on plots around their winery in Gols. Pretty much everyone else has been buying up a lot of land on the opposite side of Neusiedl lake given that it’s cooler over there (yay, climate change). It’ll be interesting to see how their offerings change over the years given that commitment to staying hyperlocal, but for the time being they’re putting out some really lovely stuff. Here, I took home the quaffable Waiting for Tom rosé and the very charming and smooth Panobile red from their more “serious” Renner line (originally their parents’, but now it’s all made by the younger generation).
We didn’t originally plan to go to **Gut Oggau** since it’s a bit far-flung, but after hearing that they had some of the better food in a region with uh…limited dining options, we ended up there for dinner and naturally drank some wine too. The Timotheus white and Josephine red were both stunners. Unfortunately, lots of stuff (including the elusive Winifred) was sold out even at the source.
This trip also turned me into a Zalto convert. Pretty much everyone we visited had Zaltos and damn…they’re nice. Picked some up as soon as I got home.
[deleted]
Had the pleasure of tasting Heinrich’s Leithaberg ~~2011~~ 2013 Chardonnay recently. The first wine that I’ve tried that smelled of oatmeal and unbuttered popcorn. If the other wines of the winery are even half as interesting, they’ve made a fan of life out of me!
🔥🔥🔥🔥
How do you go about planning such a trip? I’m still pretty new to the natural wine game, but have been consuming them like a crazy person since I discovered them. I have never visited a winemaker, but now I can’t help but research natural wine makers in close proximity to my destination (Europe) when planning trips. I find it hard to find information about how to visit them however. Some seem to have nothing on the internet what so ever. Others have websites describing their general philosophy, etc. I am yet to find a winemaker that has information about wine tours or shops attached to the vineyard. Do you just show up? Do you call in advance? Or do you go on pre-planned tours?
Rennersistas are making supercool stuff.