Germany: Von Buhl Estate - Sparkling Sekt 2020, Pfalz (Organic)

Grape variety: 100% Riesling. Certified organic. 12% alcohol.

93/100: Outstanding - highly recommended; excellent quality: "finely detailed, with prominent bubbles energetically dancing on the palate" - Wine Enthusiast 

32 months lees ageing. Only the first 50% of the pressing - the Cuvée - is used.

Fermentation and maturation is partially in stainless steel and partially in large double-pièce oak vats (2,400 litres).

German sparkling? Really? Yes, really! Germany makes a lot of fizz - what they call "Sekt" - and while plenty of it is cheap and tank rather than bottle-fermented , there are also some very fine examples such as this wine. In fact, this very fine producer is known to make amongst the very best.

Not content to rest on their laurels, Von Buhl hired an ex-Bollinger cellarmaster to ensure they continue to make the very best fizz possible, which is made in the same way and to the same exacting standards as producers like Bollinger. So....then look at the price of this wine! Bollinger's NON vintage is twice the price.

And Von Buhl's is a single vintage wine, not blended across different years. It expresses a single year and a single site; you tend to pay a lot more money for this when it comes to other traditional method fizz.

I have followed Von Buhl for a long time for their excellent still wines but hadn't tasted their sparkling until fairly recently and I was bowled over by the quality, and it differs from the norm thanks to being made from Riesling. It has great weight and texture in the mouth, and a lovely honeyed quality, yet is so refreshing.

To many winos, including Master of Wine Jancis Robinson, Riesling is the greatest grape variety of them all; it has a remarkable capacity to age a very long time. In the right hands, it certainly has the acidity and mineral extract to make beautiful fizz, clearly evidenced in this wine.

Von Buhl is one of Germany's most prestigious wine estates, with a history dating back to 1849, and is certified organic.

Unbelievably, given the quality, this is their "entry-level" fizz - they make twelve sparkling wines in total and several of them are routinely scored up to 97-98 points by wine critics.

93/100: Outstanding - highly recommended; excellent quality: "finely detailed, with prominent bubbles energetically dancing on the palate" - Wine Enthusiast