Zeltinger Schlossberg Riesling Auslese Rotlay
⏳ Drinking Window
2024 - 2042
🍽️ Food & Wine Pairings
Blue cheese, Glazed roast duck, Peach tart
✨ Technical Specifications
Hailing from the heart of the Mosel, the Zeltinger Schlossberg 'Rotlay' Auslese is a legendary expression of Riesling from one of Selbach-Oster's most prized parcels. The 'Rotlay' is a historic, extremely steep sub-plot of the Schlossberg vineyard, characterized by its iron-rich, weathered blue Devonian slate and ancient, ungrafted vines. This unique terroir imparts a distinct reddish tint to the soil and a profound mineral complexity to the wine. Johannes Selbach employs traditional, low-intervention winemaking, allowing the hand-harvested, botrytis-affected grapes to ferment naturally with wild yeasts in classic, large oak Fuder casks. The resulting Auslese is a masterclass in balance, where intense, luscious sweetness of stone fruits and wild honey is perfectly countered by a vibrant, electric vein of slate-driven acidity, ensuring remarkable longevity and evolution.
🍾 About the Producer
Weingut Selbach-Oster represents over four centuries of winemaking heritage along Germany's Middle Mosel, with family viticultural roots established in 1661. Based in Zeltingen-Rachtig, proprietors Johannes and Barbara Selbach, alongside their son Sebastian, steward approximately 23 hectares of precipitous, south-facing slopes. Their historic holdings encompass quintessential Grand Cru sites including Zeltinger Sonnenuhr, Zeltinger Schlossberg, Zeltinger Himmelreich, Wehlener Sonnenuhr, and Graacher Domprobst. Characterized by weathered Devonian blue and grey slate soils, over half the estate's vines are ungrafted, centenarian rootstocks farmed with rigorous sustainable and low-intervention methods. In the cellar, Selbach-Oster champions unhurried native yeast fermentations carried out in neutral German oak Fuder casks and temperature-controlled stainless steel. The resulting wines—spanning bone-dry Grosses Gewächs bottlings, nuanced Feinherb styles, and pristine Prädikat sweet wines—epitomize classical Mosel tension, showcasing crystalline acidity, wet-slate minerality, pristine orchard fruit, and exceptional longevity.