The score for 2011 Joh Jos Christoffel Erben Urziger Wurzgarten Riesling Spatlese is 91 from Robert Parker and the tasting note - From what he describes as an ideally exposed south-facing parcel that holds moisture – and whence his 2011 Spatlese trocken was picked beforehand – Kajo Christoffel’s 2011 Urziger Wurzgarten Riesling Auslese features honeydew melon, kiwi, and limeade underlain by wet stone in a delicate, polished, luscious amalgam that both soothes and stimulates, and at even a mere 7% alcohol still harbors unexaggerated sweetness, finishing with a cut, clarity, and infectious juiciness rare for a wine from this site in this vintage. This may well acquire additional complexity with time in bottle and should drink well through at least 2030 (and no, that’s no misprint!). Veteran Karl-Josef “Kajo” Christoffel (for more about whose estate and methodology consult especially my report in issue 192) is, like the Merkelbachs, wont to bottle as Spatlese a wine that most other Mosel growers covered in my reports would have declared as Kabinett. But even allowing for that fact, the delicacy and low alcohol exhibited in his 2011 collection at all levels of dryness and Pradikat – allied to judicious, never exaggerated sweetness – must be in large part attributed to old vines and savvy viticulture, because it’s strikingly evident that Christoffel can get his fruit delectably ripe-tasting at must weights low by Middle Mosel standards. (If part of the “secret” is higher yields, then clearly achieving them is no vice!) The 2011 Auslesen were picked relatively late in Christoffel’s harvest, in the third week of October. It’s nice, incidentally, to see these wines receiving increased attention and praise in the German press, though I have to say that I find some of it to have gone overboard.