100% Riesling

Food pairings: Spicy Thai or Sichuan dishes, roast pork, or smoked trout.

Winemaking: The wine was fermented spontaneously in old Mosel Fuder casks. Each parcel is vinified separately, one fuder per parcel, and the estate's Prädikat wines are never a blend of more than two parcels, as the fuder numbers in the label's AP number show.

Vineyards and terroir: The Ürziger Würzgarten is a steep Mosel slope of stony, weathered red slate. Merkelbach's vines there escaped the replanting that reshaped most of the hill and still grow on their own original roots, with an average age of about 45 years.

Family and history: Brothers Alfred and Rolf Merkelbach spent their lives in Ürzig, tending their small estate into their seventies and making the wines in a famously traditional style, with Spätlesen that taste like classic Spätlesen. In 2016 they asked Johannes and Barbara Selbach to carry the estate on; 2020 was the first vintage made fully by the Selbachs. Rolf died in October 2023 and Alfred in May 2024, so the 2024 was the first harvest after both brothers had gone. The Selbachs continue to make the wines in the brothers' style.

In the pictures: Alfred and Rolf Merkelbach in their vineyard; members of the Merkelbach and Selbach families in the Merkelbach cellar; the estate's steep Mosel slopes in autumn light; and the red rock and vineyard terraces of the Ürziger Würzgarten above the Mosel. The portrait of the brothers is courtesy of Skurnik Wines; the other photographs are from Weingut Alfred Merkelbach.