Riesling Kappelweg Vendanges Tardives
⏳ Drinking Window
2025 - 2045
🍽️ Food & Wine Pairings
glazed pork belly, spicy Thai curry, aged Munster cheese
✨ Technical Specifications
Hailing from the historic Kappelweg lieu-dit—whose name translates to the 'path of the chapel'—this late-harvest Riesling is a masterclass in Alsatian patience and terroir. The Kappelweg vineyard is characterized by its heavy, clay-marl and limestone soils, which impart a profound structural power and a distinct, stony minerality to the grapes. Domaine Rolly Gassmann allows the grapes to hang on the vine long into the autumn, encouraging the development of noble rot and concentrating the natural sugars. In accordance with the estate's traditionalist philosophy, the wine undergoes a slow fermentation with indigenous yeasts and is aged for years in their massive cellars before release. The resulting Vendanges Tardives style is a sublime tension between luscious, honeyed sweetness and a searing, vibrant acidity, unfolding complex layers of candied citrus, petrol, ginger, and white flowers.
🍾 About the Producer
Domaine Rolly Gassmann emerged in 1967 through the marriage of Marie-Thérèse Rolly and Louis Gassmann, unifying two families with winemaking lineages in Alsace dating to 1676 and 1611 respectively. Situated in Rorschwihr along the complex Ribeauvillé fault line, the estate commands over 50 hectares characterized by a mosaic of 21 distinct limestone-dominant subsoil profiles. Opting out of the Alsace Grand Cru hierarchy in favor of expressing traditional historic lieux-dits, current winemaker Pierre Gassmann operates strictly within biodynamic rhythms. The viticultural approach champions late physiological and phenological harvesting, intentionally courting noble rot across micro-parcels. In the cellar, natural fermentations proceed unhurried for four to six months. Celebrated for an obsessive dedication to bottle maturation, Rolly Gassmann stores millions of bottles in a state-of-the-art multi-level cellar before commercial release. The benchmark portfolio spans opulent, long-lived expressions from lieux-dits such as Silberberg, Kappelweg, and Pflaenzerreben, alongside lusciously concentrated Vendanges Tardives and Sélection de Grains Nobles.
🍇 Grapes
Riesling