Schiefersteil Riesling
⏳ Drinking Window
2022 - 2030
🍽️ Food & Wine Pairings
Spicy Asian cuisine such as Thai green curry, roasted pork loin with apples, or fresh pan-seared trout.
✨ Technical Specifications
Markus Molitor's "Schiefersteil" Riesling is a love letter to the dramatic, gravity-defying slate slopes of Germany's Mosel Valley. Taking over his family's estate in 1984 at the age of twenty, Molitor set out to revive the golden era of Mosel wine through uncompromising quality and traditional methods. "Schiefersteil," translating to "steep slate," is crafted from 100% Riesling grapes harvested by hand from precipitously steep vineyards. The vines dig deep into the weathered Devonian slate soils, which absorb the sun's heat during the day and radiate it back to the vines at night. In the cellar, Molitor champions minimalist intervention: the juice undergoes spontaneous fermentation with native yeasts in large, traditional oak fuder casks and stainless steel, followed by prolonged contact with the fine lees. This yields a dry, intensely mineral-driven Riesling that balances vibrant, laser-like acidity with rich stone fruit notes and a signature smoky, flinty complexity.
🍾 About the Producer
Founded in 1984 when twenty-year-old Markus Molitor assumed control of his family's winemaking legacy, Weingut Markus Molitor has evolved into an undisputed titan of the Mosel. Based at Haus Klosterberg, Molitor manages over 100 hectares encompassing premier steep-slope crus along both the Middle Mosel and Saar, including Wehlener Sonnenuhr, Ürziger Würzgarten, Erdener Prälat, and Scharzhofberg. Viticulture is strictly manual on precipitous gradients of weathered Devonian blue, red, and grey slate. Molitor pursues an uncompromising philosophy centered on sustainable farming, late selective harvesting, native yeast fermentation, and prolonged aging on fine lees in traditional wooden Fuders carved into subterranean slate cellars. Renowned for its singular capsule coding system—white indicating dry, green denoting feinherb (off-dry), and gold designating noble sweet expressions, often tiered with asterisks—the estate crafts crystalline, hyper-mineral Rieslings of monumental depth and aging potential, alongside site-expressive Pinot Noir and Weissburgunder.