At VinItaly last year  I was introduced to a jovial German fella by Peter Zemmer, our producer from the Alto Adige. This guy is a pretty serious German wine broker and it turned out that he had often holidayed in Schull and was a big fan of hurling. Honestly I’m constantly amazed at how in the oddest of places I am reminded of my nationality. I was in a remote forest park in Honduras in January and went white water rafting – the instructor was from Derry.

Anyway I explained to him that German wines – despite their consistently remarkable quality – were too much of a niche for me when you considered all my other currently stocked niches: USA, cru Prosecco, biodynamic wines etc. I love a niche as much as the next guy, but sometimes I do have to put on my business hat…

So about a month later I received samples from Weingut Hofmann in the Rheinhessen! I really don’t like producers incurring the cost of shipping samples without my request as it’s a hugely expensive process, and always advise potential suppliers against it until I have checked out the other elements and made sure that their product could potentially fit into our portfolio. Naturally I informed my contact that I was not actively looking for German wines, and that the samples would be joining the far end of the que.

Well I got around to one or two over the last while, and on Wednesday night I decided to crack open this bottle as it was a rare sunny evening on the suburban decking and we were cooking Sea Bream with a sweet pepper salsa:

2007 Hofmann Riesling Hundertgulden Trocken

Hofmann made himself at home on the deck
Hofmann relaxed on the deck, soaking up the summer vibes

Simply put it was awesome. A hugely complex wine with wonderfully layered crab apple, honey, quince, slate and satsuma flavours. Phenomenal length, concentration, balance and restraint. One of the best whites I’ve had all year.

By the end of my glass my eyebrows were cramping from spending so much time raised.

Summer has been relatively kind to us so far, and here’s to hoping we get a few more days where we can toast the sun, dine al fresco and be fortunate enough to have some great juice on hand. It’s just a pity that there isn’t more of a market for German wines here.