| Vintage Name Variety | Publication Reviewer Score More... | |
|---|---|---|
| White |
2010 Alzinger Grüner Veltliner Federspiel MühlpointWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-103. ($31.00) This is the hillside below the Steinertal, where the slope moderates and you don’t need terraces. The soil changes too, and we’re into the lentil and green-bean side of GrüVe now. But where this wine is usually soft and elliptical, this ’10 is remarkably forceful, almost like a corpulent Loibenberg; steel-spined, mizuna and maitakes; length and even minerality, unusual for the site. Almost craggy, and demands oxygen. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Grüner Veltliner Smaragd LoibenbergWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-105. ($59.00) More elegant and silky and lössy – you really taste it this year. Rye dough and caraway, less exotic than usual. But aristocratic elegance to go with its adamant force. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Grüner Veltliner Smaragd MühlpointWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-104. ($46.00) More belly-richness now but still with an iron backbone; great force of aroma, great force period, with secret-sweetness, classic vetiver and green bean but so focused and buzzing, like someone shot a taser at the extract. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Grüner Veltliner Smaragd SteinertalWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-106. ($67.00) Swollen green. Less crazy-lime and hyssop and mint, and more balsam and boxwood. But the palate is iridescent and charged, really spearminty and wonderfully juicily mineral; you feel the 14% alc but there’s great mass to support it. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Riesling Federspiel DürnsteinerWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-107. ($36.00) By far the best this wine has ever been; sleek and feline with complex multi-nuanced mid-palate interplay of sweet green herbs and citrus and aloe-vera, and a marvelous dialogue of delicacy and force, lime and creaminess. As good as “small” scale Riesling ever gets. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Riesling Smaragd Dürnsteiner HollerinWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-109. ($58.00) Completely lavish peach and nectarine aromas are typical for the site, but this is actually slimmer and finer than the Liebenberg, in a kind of role-reversal. It isn’t “better,” just more finely structured and a little lighter-bodied, more vamping and feline. Call it more feminine, maybe. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Riesling Smaragd Dürnsteiner LiebenbergWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-108. ($58.00) And again, the best this wine has ever been! Just amazingly fine this vintage; radishy aromas, but wow, the fruit; pure apricot, and with air the fragrance is also steeped in it, but what’s brilliant is the orange-green interplay between apricot and wintergreen, and of course the dynamism and focus. At its relatively moderate price, this endlessly long masterpiece is not to be missed. My highest praise? I couldn’t spit it. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Riesling Smaragd LoibenbergWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-111. ($62.00) Purest noblest Riesling aromas yield to a palate that is in no way yielding and yet still seems to melt into a creamy swoon, exquisite and mysterious, and seeming to get shadier and cooler as it lingers; begins by singing and ends by murmuring. Begins by kissing and ends by falling asleep in your arms, breathing blissful and soft and dozy. |
| White |
2010 Alzinger Riesling Smaragd SteinertalWachau more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ALA-112. ($70.00) At first only the highest notes of its classic aromas. The palate is firm, cool, sharply detailed. All silver, sun on rocks, moon on rocks, almost a shriek of mint. It bores into your palate with its precise attack. Only on the finish does an herbal juiciness emerge, and then with air it grows more prominent as the wine opens its arms. Right now it is nearly supernal, but in 1-2 years I’d approach it with awe. |
| Red |
2009 Weingut Berger Blauer Zweigelt HaidKremstal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-118. ($22.00) Boy that ’08 as such a dead-ringer for an 80s Zin, back when you could drink them, back when they gave some odd archaic thing called “pleasure.” He still has 40 cases of it, if you want it. This ’09 is rounder and shows more mid-palate tobacco and stock, rounder contours and fewer angles, less briar than the ’08; easier to “get” if you respond to warmth per se. But they’re both happy-tongue puppies, with the ’08 more mischievous and the ’09 more sedate. |
| Red |
2006 Weingut Berger Blauer Zweigelt LeithenKremstal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-095. ($28.00) 2nd and 3rd-use barriques here, but the wine isn’t markedly oaky; indeed an almost Burgundian aroma, complex and almost overwhelmingly fruity; the palate is a whipcrack of spice but also deep juicy texture that begs to be swallowed; this is a sexy wine in the modern idiom but it isn’t overwrought or pornographic; it’s true body, true fruit, real flavor you can use. |
| White |
2010 Weingut Berger Gelber MuskatellerKremstal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-117. ($22.00) To this catty little ’10; there’s a dialogue of Madagascar pepper and char and, interestingly, apples. As always, the poise of creaminess and snap is so fresh and enticing. You may try to cavil the wine is slight, until you’re forced to contemplate the 5-minute finish. |
| White |
2010 Weingut Berger Grüner VeltlinerKremstal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-111L. ($17.00) CORE-LIST WINE. It’s the silvery leafy side of GrüVe, snap and brassica, sorrel and boxwood, bright and salty. For sure less fruit than the overachieving ’09, but there’s more lift in these ‘10s. |
| White |
2010 Weingut Berger Grüner Veltliner LössterrassenKremstal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-114. ($22.00) Classic down-the-middle löss GrüVe – an ur GV to teach a class with – and in ’10 you have a tatsoi and ore-like snap. These wines pinch and nibble in the nicest way. |
| White |
2010 Weingut Berger Grüner Veltliner Reserve GeblingKremstal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-115. ($27.00) Sometimes the higher peaks of ’10 stay encased in their dark shrouds. Even when ripe – and this packs 13.5% alc – there’s little swell of fruit, but instead an intensified gravelly iron focus, flint and mizuna. Needs a lot of oxygen. Mind you, it’s 2 weeks in-bottle when I tasted it, which explains a lot. It’s hugely mineral and salty, with notes of broad-leaf parsely. |
| White |
2010 Weingut Berger Riesling Reserve Steingraben Kremstalmore |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-116. ($27.00) Well here’s some fruit. Pure apricot and overripe plums and roasted red pepper and verbena; the palate is loaded, fruit-packed, herbal and limey and shimmery. Almost like a Gaisberg with its shirt untucked. |
| Red |
2010 Weingut Berger ZweigeltKremstal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABG-112L. ($17.00) Attractive in every way, and fresher than the ’09; more the Dolcetto gurgle, silky and tight and spicy. |
| White - Sparkling |
2007 Weingut Willi Bründlmayer BrutKamptal White Blend more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-239. ($43.00) Disgorged 11/10, I like this even more than the ’06. It’s all the Pinots (including Chardonnay) and a teensy bit of GrüVe, and this is the closest Austrian sparkling wine has ever come to Champagne, not just in graciousness and class, but in actual flavor. It could almost – almost – be mistaken for Hébrart’s “Selection.” Mirabelles, sweet hay, scallops, cookie-dough, seductive stuff! More overt fruit than Champagne (which might be the GrüVe) and perfectly calibrated rs – his most elegant and gregarious yet. |
| Rosé - Sparkling |
NV Weingut Willi Bründlmayer Brut RoséKamptal Rosé Blend more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-179. ($43.00) Odd what people tell you. Last year this was “all 2008” and this year it’s “mostly ’07 with some ’08,” and I’m either mistaken or confused. In any case it’s still one-third each of Pinot Noir, Zweigelt and St. Laurent, and it has a coral salmon-y color, even salmon-caviar; lots of round fruit this time – the Pinot shows most – groseille aromas lead to a palate like orange cherry-tomatoes; a charming, long and tasty Rosé, less berried and angular than earlier renditions. This has some yummy love-handles. |
| Red |
2003 Weingut Willi Bründlmayer Cabernet FrancKamptal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-242. ($52.00) Classic tobacco-y hot-vintage Cab Franc; tannic as is his wont, but with food this will have a suave lamb-y richness. |
| White |
2007 Weingut Willi Bründlmayer Grüner Veltliner Alte Reben Kamptalmore |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-195. ($47.00) The ’07 is evolving into a salty, subtle, grainy quiet beauty. Almost meditative. Certainly the better choice for a restaurant as it’s farther along. |
| White |
2009 Weingut Willi Bründlmayer Grüner Veltliner Alte Reben Kamptal Reservemore |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-237. ($49.00) This ’09 smells about as good as GrüVe knows how to smell. Amazing exhalation of sweet meadow and verbena; sweetness and roughness together, not “nice,” but kind. The palate is gracious yet with a lash of mint, a sort of harmless savagery, ringent peppery length, whipsawing all over the place. No two consecutive sips are the same. |
| White |
2010 Weingut Willi Bründlmayer Grüner Veltliner Berg-VogelsangKamptal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-243. ($32.00) Superb in this vintage! Iridescent brilliance and high-toned aromas; brashly mineral, grey and green, apples and the skins of apples; super expressive and generous. |
| White |
2002 Weingut Willi Bründlmayer Grüner Veltliner KäferbergKamptal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-249. ($79.00) The 2002 is now a classic example of the way some GrüVes take on white Burgundy tones with age; this one’s a serious taste-a-like for one of the less mealy Meursault 1er Crus. |
| White |
2008 Weingut Willi Bründlmayer Grüner Veltliner LammKamptal more |
Terry Theise Estate Selections, Terry Theise2011 Austrian Catalog (5/1/2011) ABY-213. ($73.00) This is as good as a lot of things get. GrüVe, white wine, big white wine...the site is a heat trap on limestone-bearing loam, and who is luckier than I am to have three growers here! There is, by the way, an ’09 in the wings and it too has “+++” potential. But this wine is both very fine and also great – not always the case for any wine. It has a repose the hyperactive Käferberg doesn’t have, an extraordinary complexity and a quiet force; it’s an easily great wine, i.e., it envelops you in its embrace instead of knocking you over. It doesn’t blow you away – it blesses you. And the mysterious richness of this blessing haunts you for hours. |
Terry Theise Estate Selections (click to search again)
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- Wines: 160
