Erdener Treppchen Riesling Auslese
⏳ Drinking Window
2022 - 2042
🍽️ Food & Wine Pairings
Classic blue cheeses, spicy Asian dishes such as Thai curry, and fruit-based desserts like pear tart.
✨ Technical Specifications
The Erdener Treppchen, meaning 'the little staircase of Erden,' is one of the Mosel's most legendary grand cru vineyards, named for the stone steps carved into its dizzyingly steep, iron-rich red slate slopes to help workers navigate the terrain. Dr. Loosen's Erdener Treppchen Riesling Auslese is crafted from 100% Riesling grapes, often harvested with a touch of noble rot (botrytis) to concentrate the sugars and flavors. The red slate soil imparts a muscular, intensely mineral character to the wine, distinct from the softer blue slate found elsewhere in the region. Erni Loosen’s commitment to preserving ancient, ungrafted vines ensures a wine of profound depth, balancing luscious sweetness with a piercing, vibrant acidity that defines classic Mosel Auslese.
🍾 About the Producer
Weingut Dr. Loosen stands as one of the preeminent global ambassadors of Germany's Mittelmosel. Under family ownership for more than two centuries, the estate experienced an epochal renaissance after Ernst 'Erni' Loosen assumed leadership in 1988. Loosen immediately implemented draconian yield restrictions, prohibited chemical fertilizers, and embraced spontaneous fermentations in neutral oak Fuder casks, frequently practicing extended lees contact. The domaine's strength rests in its holdings of ancient, ungrafted vines—many over a century old—clinging to perilous, south-facing slate amphitheaters. These steep slopes span blue Devonian slate in the Wehlener Sonnenuhr, red volcanic-slate colluvium in the Ürziger Würzgarten, and heat-retaining cliffs in the Erdener Prälat. Dr. Loosen is renowned both for crystalline, classically delicate Prädikat expressions defined by buoyant acidity and low alcohol, and for benchmark dry Grosses Gewächs bottlings that celebrate age-worthy, mineral-driven tension.