What?
Juice 2017 Grüner Veltliner Smaragd, Ried Liebenberg, F.X. Pichler, Wachau, AUT
Grape 100% Grüner Veltliner
Farming Sustainable, Vegetarian, Practising Organic, Vegan
Tasting Note On the nose, ripe yellow apple, honeydew, candied orange zest and a hint of honey. The palate is complex and juicy, with silky texture, delicate acidity and a balancing fruity sweetness. Tropical fruit flavours and a lovely minerality carry though onto the finish.
Who?
F.X. Pichler is located in Wachau, a region so remarkably beautiful it has earned a spot on Unesco’s World Heritage list. The Pichler family have been farmers in the region for five generations. Franz Xavier (F.X.) built a winery in 1971, and his son Lucas makes the wines today. Lucas’ grandfather began with three hectares of land, which have now grown to 20 hectares because Lucas finds it hard to say no when rare vineyard plots are made available for sale.
Why?
The climate in the Wachau is influenced by several sources: the moderating Danube River, cold air from the forests in Waldviertel and Dunkelsteiner and warm air from the Pannonian basin. From a need to adapt to the effects of global climate change, F.X. Pichler have left the Vinea Wachau association and the 2020 vintage is the first to fall under the Districtus Austriae Controllatus (DAC) regulations. Going forward, the wines will drop the ‘Federspiel’ and ‘Smaragd’ classifications based on must weights and will be labelled according to a three-tier system, either as regional, village or single site wines.
With?
Weinerschnitzel, the geographically protected (WTFF?!) Austrian version made with Veal and not to be confused with its German counterpart of the Pork variety is just about as good a regional pairing as you could ever find anywhere at any time in history. Even if you spent a life time travelling like Michael J Fox in Back to the Future on a mission to find the greatest regional food and wine pairing in the Galaxy you still probably wouldn’t find anything better. Ever. Anywhere. In History. Mind you, now that we think of it, Asian dishes and spice are pretty damn good pairing too…