Riesling Smaragd Loibner Berg
⏳ Drinking Window
2024 - 2040
🍽️ Food & Wine Pairings
roasted pork belly, spicy Thai curry, pan-seared scallops
✨ Technical Specifications
Hailing from the legendary Loibenberg vineyard, one of the oldest and most imposing terraced sites in the Wachau, this Riesling Smaragd is a monument to Austrian viticulture. Documented as far back as 1002 in monastic charters, the Loibenberg rises steeply above the Danube, capturing intense sunlight on its south-facing, hand-built stone terraces. Here, the weathered Gföhl gneiss soils, topped with loess and loam, impart a profound, fiery minerality to the grapes. F.X. Pichler's meticulous cellar practices—utilizing large, neutral oak casks and allowing brief skin contact—preserve the pure, structural power of the fruit. The 'Smaragd' designation, named after the emerald-green lizards that dart among the warm vineyard stones, represents the pinnacle of the Wachau ripeness classification, yielding a dry white wine of extraordinary concentration, vibrant acidity, and deep, exotic complexity.
🍾 About the Producer
Founded in 1898 in the village of Oberloiben in Austria's prestigious Wachau region, Weingut F.X. Pichler is globally celebrated as a benchmark producer of world-class white wines. Elevated to international renown by Franz Xaver (F.X.) Pichler and guided today by Lucas Pichler, the estate adheres to a meticulous viticultural philosophy centered on terroir precision, minimal cellar intervention, and the expression of ancient, primary rock terraces. Sourced from legendary steep vineyard sites such as Kellerberg, Loibenberg, and Steinertal, their dry white wines showcase extraordinary concentration, minerality, and tension. The winery is particularly famed for its powerful, age-worthy Grüner Veltliner and Riesling bottlings, highlighted by monumental flagship cuvées like 'Unendlich'.
🍇 Grape Varieties
Riesling
🍷 Alcohol By Volume (ABV)
13% - 14%