1996 Trimbach, Riesling "Clos Ste Hune"

(Old-school Riesling - old image)

Blend: 100% Riesling

Vineyard: We are in Hunawihr - the site is located at the centre of the Rosacker Grand Cru vineyard.

Soil: Limestone

Production: approx. 9000 bottles per year.

Bonus: Clos Ste Hune is monopole of Domaine F.E. Trimbach, and has been owned by the Trimbach family for over two centuries.

Glass: Zalto Universal

I have always admired Clos Ste Hune from Trimbach.

I have tasted the wine on several occasion and vintages. It's an incredible long-lived Riesling. I remember being fortuned to taste some of the really old vintages and it's always fun to see people blind guessing 20-30 years off on a bottle of CSH from the nineteen sixties.

I have tasted the 1996 vintage 6 times – but man it has been a while. So I really looked forward to dig in and going down memory lane.

I had the wine I tree stages. First with dinner (I had opened the wine 2 hours before serving) - Coq au Riesling, then a couple of glasses without the food and 2 hours later, when all the putting the kids to bed, cleaning up the house had ended – I sat down and had the last third of the wine.

First stage revealed an incredible rich wine, with lots of sensational fruit servings, such as honey infected fruit and divine sweet and vivid fruit. You also had some of the classic Riesling trademark, the scent of petroleum. Tasting the wine is a mineral overload and an incredible structured finish.

The second stage of the wine was the least interesting. It was like the fruit had contracted, bringing out some darker patterns and the honey scents now felt like there going more to dark caramel. Maybe I am a bit sensitive and saw the sulpur-ghosts – but it felt like a note, which reminded me of sulphur. It was certainly not nice, but it could very well just have been some spicy notes.

2 hours later – the wine had transformed and was actually fresher and divine lime-driven. No more mysterious sulphur notes and the lush fruit from the opening were now transformed into a sleek and crystallized fruit bath. The aftertaste was seriously impressive - really long and filling the entire mouth with mineral grains.

Stunning Riesling, but I will have to say, it wasn’t an emotional wine – my heart belongs to something else now. But from an objective view, Clos Ste Hune are still paradise for Rieslings lovers.