- June 8, 2012
Hofgut Falkenstein in the States
- by Lars Carlberg
Uwe Kristen, who has the blog Der Kellermeister and now lives with his family north of NYC, nearby the Hudson River, says:
Are you replacing VOS here in the US for distributing Hofgut Falkenstein?
- Posted in Articles, Letters
- | Tagged: Hofgut Falkenstein, Saar
Yes, in 2011, LCS replaced Kerlin Wines/VOS Selections, which, incredibly, still had some 2006 vintage in stock at the time, but failed to import Hofgut Falkenstein’s outstanding 2007, 2008, and 2009 vintages. These have all since sold out in Germany, as most of the 2010s did shortly thereafter. So I had three 2010 Riesling selections: Krettnacher Altenberg Spätlese trocken, Niedermenniger Sonnenberg Spätlese feinherb, and Krettnacher Euchariusberg Auslese. Unfortunately, the Webers’ excellent dry-tasting Niedermenniger Herrenberg Riesling Spätlese was already out of stock and not available for import. This was just above 9 grams of sugar, but it didn’t have “halbtrocken” or “feinherb” on the label. The 2011 and 2012 Herrenberg Spätlese feinherb both had more residual sugar.
Like Peter Lauer, David Schildknecht had once imported the then-called “Falkensteiner Hof” for his retail clients in Washington, DC. Back then, James Wright was his assistant and got to know Erich Weber as well. When James went on to work at VOS, in NYC, he started distributing some German wines, including Falkenstein, via the importer Kerlin Wines, which was based in DC. James has since left VOS and now works for Winemonger. (He has recently added Schmitges, which is quite different from Falkenstein and was his other Mosel producer in the VOS portfolio.)
By the way, David had introduced me to Falkenstein back in 2006, but I had already known Peter Lauer before I met David. It’s often been assumed that he introduced me to Lauer as well.