VIEW FROM THE CELLAR - Keller Wein

hauntingly delicate and filigreed this year as to make one wonder if this kind of ethereal,
“well water” style of Kabinett is going to be lost forever at VDP estates when the new
regulations take effect at all member estates in 2014 and Kabinetts will no longer be able
to be made from grapes with must weights below the level of Spätlese.
Across the board, the 2009ers from Weingut Keller are the finest to date of Klaus-
Peter’s young and already illustrious career. He has made both brilliant dry and sweet
wines this year, and though I did not taste them, I am sure that the pinot noirs from 2009
will be outstanding as well. We started off our tasting with the 2008 reds this time, as I
had not seen the wines in a year and this is a more appropriate time to be getting a read
on pinot noir, as six months after the harvest is really just too young to be handicapping
pinot in my opinion (though I probably did it last year). There will be a new pinot noir in
the future at Weingut Keller as well, as Klaus-Peter has just purchased a parcel of vines
in the Morstein vineyard that was planted with sixty-five year-old sylvaner vines and
grafted them over to pinot noir- the cuttings for which came from Freddy Mugnier’s
Chambolle-Musigny “les Fuées” vineyard. The first vintage of this pinot from the
Morstein will be the 2011. It will be very exciting to see how these old vines take to pinot
noir and how the Morstein’s terroir will define this pinot noir in the coming years- I
suspect the answers to both questions will be extremely positive in nature!
The white wines from Klaus-Peter in 2009 are clearly the finest wines he has ever
crafted, and fans of his dry wines are duly warned out of the blocks to also take note to
the magical noble sweet wines that he has made this year, as they are clearly amongst the
finest to be found anywhere in Germany in 2009. There is opulence and very clean, pure
botrytis in the dessert-styled wines, and haunting delicacy in several of Kabinetts and
Spätlesen this year that recall some mythical golden age of German Riesling. As far as
the dry wines go, the two Sylvaners are superb, and the lower level dry Rieslings are all
as fine as I have ever tasted here (and there have been some amazing values previously).
As far as the Grosses Gewächs bottlings are concerned, all have come in at thirteen
percent alcohol, with the exception of the new Pettenthal, which is only 12.5 percent.
Across the board, these are the most elegant and refined Grosses Gewächs bottlings from
Klaus-Peter to date, and will be worth a special search of the market to add to the cellar.
At Weingut van Volxem there is a very serious effort underway to recreate the glories of
the past, and at Weingut Egon Müller there is a connection to the past that has never
been severed and continues on as a living and breathing thing, but here at Weingut
Keller, one senses that the best facets of both the past and the future have been
synthesized into one of the most insightful and inspired set of wines that one can find in
all of Germany. And when the amazement at the quality of the wines gets the upper hand
and one asks Klaus-Peter how he is doing all this magic, his answer is both simple and
seems as if it should have been self-evident, so that the questioner feels a bit foolish at
even having asked: “In the end I have to just trust the vineyard each year and try not to
lose too much of the potential of each vintage in the cellar.” Let’s just say that there was
little lost potential in the Keller cellars this year!