Riesling Estate bottled Dry Classique 2019

Forge Cellars

Riesling Estate bottled Dry Classique
2019

  • In conversion
Country
United States
Regulated designation
American Viticultural Areas (AVA)
Region
New-York
Subregion
Finger Lakes
Classification
Estate bottled
Varietal(s)
Riesling 100 %
Colour
White
Sugar
Dry
Sugar content
3 g/l
Producer's website

About this winery

Our choices in the cellar guard the purity of our vineyards. Simply put, we make wine in the traditional, handcrafted manner. We harvest by hand. We sort by hand. We load the grapes into the press by hand. We shovel the vats out by hand. We employ spontaneous fermentation and ferment in very tiny lots, so that we truly understand the expression of the vineyard each year. We use very low levels of sulphur, ferment our Rieslings bone dry, and do not fine or filter our red wines. Our indigenous...

See the Forge Cellars detail page for more information on this brand

Product notes

Our Classique is our most important wine because it reflects our work on a larger scale. Sixteen different lieux-dits (single vineyards), each vinified separately, are the basis of this wine and represent the DNA of Classique. This wine is like you and me—we are individually unique, but we represent all of our ancestors at the same time. We carry their traits. The 2018 vintage was challenging in the lakes, but I deeply enjoyed it. After 28 vintages in the Rhône (and eight vintages on Seneca Lake), the wines that I am the proudest of are the wines from the challenging Rhône vintages: 1993, 1996, 1997, 2008, and 2014. All of them show unexpected quality, drinkability, and freshness. They demonstrate how precise and hard work can potentialize a vintage. In 2018, we pushed the limits of ripening with Riesling like never before and we took some risks. We refuse to be driven by fear. Yes, we sorted out a lot of fruit by hand. Yes, we worked hard. And as is often the case, the level of quality is superb because this is how Riesling works, as a grape of incredible resources and resilience. We picked roughly three weeks after everyone in the lakes, in mid to late October, but this is the appropriate way to achieve ripening that allows the wines to ferment bone dry. In 2017, we ended up having beautiful wines. I think 2018, in this regard, is quite similar. - LB

Production notes

Soils: shale, gravelly loam and clay with limestone. Fermented in 70% French oak barrels and 30% stainless steel tanks.

Tasting notes

licorice - apricot - chamomile