Albalonga TBA
⏳ wine.drinking_window
Typically best enjoyed 15 to 50+ years from vintage release, though capable of aging almost indefinitely under proper cellar conditions.
🍽️ wine.food_pairings
Blue cheese, foie gras, apricot tart
✨ wine.spec_sheet
While Weingut Wittmann is globally renowned for its dry Rieslings, their sweet dessert wines represent an ultra-rare, historic peak of German winemaking. This Trockenbeerenauslese is crafted from Albalonga, an uncommon grape variety crossed from Riesling and Silvaner in 1951. Albalonga is highly susceptible to noble rot (Botrytis cinerea) and retains remarkable acidity even at extreme ripeness levels, making it ideal for the painstaking, berry-by-berry selection required for a TBA. In the cellar, the highly concentrated must ferments exceptionally slowly. The resulting elixir is a monument to patience, offering an intense bouquet of dried apricots, honey, exotic spices, and a vibrant, mineral-driven acidity that perfectly balances its luscious sweetness.
🍾 wine.about_producer
With a winegrowing heritage in the Rheinhessen village of Westhofen dating back to 1663, Weingut Wittmann is a pioneering force in German biodynamic viticulture, having committed to organic practices in 1990 and biodynamics in 2004. Managed today by Philipp Wittmann alongside his family, the estate is globally revered for its precise, terroir-driven dry Rieslings sourced from legendary Grosses Gewächs sites like Morstein, Kirchspiel, and Aulerde. In their historic vaulted cellar built in 1829, the wines are fermented with indigenous yeasts and aged in traditional large oak casks, resulting in structured, mineral-rich expressions of outstanding longevity.