The 2017 Graacher Domprobst Riesling Auslese is clear and intense on the elegant and flinty nose with its crunchy and refreshing slate aromas. On the palate, this is a brilliant, salty-piquant and mouthwatering Auslese that is light, finessed, complex, tight and tensioned and really pulls forward. A great wine that will taste even better in 50 years, says Johannes Selbach. Tasted in March 2019.

Lightly baked and caramelized apple, quince jelly and marzipan announce on the nose that this will be an opulent performance under the ennobling direction of botrytis. Yet for all of the honeyed richness and confectionary as well as caramelized and confitured character that emerge on a lush, glycerol-rich palate, there is also a welcome influx of fresh lime and apple whose animating juiciness persists into this wine’s superbly sustained, mouthwateringly salt-tinged finish.