Westhofener Steingrube Albalonga TBA
⏳ wine.drinking_window
Typically best enjoyed 15 to 50 years from the vintage release, with the potential to age gracefully for many decades.
🍽️ wine.food_pairings
Blue cheese, fruit-based tarts, foie gras
✨ wine.spec_sheet
A rare and legendary sweet wine, the Westhofener Steingrube Albalonga Trockenbeerenauslese (TBA) showcases Weingut Wittmann's mastery beyond their famous dry Rieslings. Albalonga, an uncommon grape variety crossed in 1951 from Rieslaner and Müller-Thurgau, finds a perfect home in the limestone-heavy soils of the Steingrube vineyard in Westhofen. This terroir provides a distinct mineral backbone that beautifully structures the grape's naturally high acidity. Because Albalonga is highly susceptible to botrytis, it is ideally suited for luscious dessert wines. The grapes are painstakingly harvested by hand, berry by shriveled berry, to capture the pure essence of noble rot. Fermented slowly in the estate's cool, historic vaulted cellars, this TBA is a masterclass in balance, offering intense concentration, honeyed complexity, and a vibrant acidity that keeps the wine remarkably fresh and elegant.
🍾 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.