2022 JB Becker Riesling Trocken - Wallufer

Jean Baptiste Becker created this family estate in the Rheingau in 1893. Grandson Hans Joseph Becker took over in 1971 and changed the focus to dry (trocken) wines, long before they became popular in the Rheingau and other parts of Germany. “HaJo”, as his friends call him, farms 11 hectares of vines and has been working organically for decades. All fermentations are spontaneous, and élevage is in the traditional 2,400-liter barrels of the Rheingau. Importer Stephen Bitterolf (Vom Boden) describes the wines in this way: “For all this depth and mysteriousness, Becker’s white wines are like Becker himself: angular, tensile with elbows and muscle and sinew pulled tightly over a lean frame. They flaunt a rather prominent acidity that recalls the more nervy wines of the Mosel, Saar and Ruwer, though there is a weight, a density that speaks of the Rheingau. They seem to have more to do with great Chablis than with what we often think of as German Riesling.” 

Becker’s Riesling Trocken Wallufer is his dry village wine from several vineyard parcels around his town of Walluf. It is spicy, stony, salty, and vivid. There is a lemon-limey vibe and a long, mineral-and-earth finish. Pop the classy glass stopper and enjoy this first-rate riesling with seafood (raw or cooked), Wiener or pork Schnitzel, or white asparagus.