| Yves T. |
In various restaurants along the Moselle (area of Traben-Trarbach), I noticed that wine lists are divided into chapters called "trocken", "halbtrocken", "lieblich", "edelsüsse Spezialitäten". All these categories are fairly clear to me, but occasionally one encounters "feinherb" as well.
Am I right in assuming that this is somewere between trocken and halbtrocken (kind of "vierteltrocken" or "dreivierteltrocken") or is it more complicated than that?
Thanks for your assistance
Yves
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| Anders Tørneskog |
Hi
That's a difficult one, actually, because there's no legal definition of the term, even when it's an allowed one. The glossary of the well informed German website wein-plus.de puts it between dry and semi-dry as Yves says, contrary to what I have seen and experienced myself in the Moselle... So even German experts seem to be confused.
The "correct" answer is: Between semi-dry and moderately sweet (halbtrocken and lieblich). The residual sugar will then be 18-25 gr/l which fits well with various wine lists I've seen.
The reason might be that sweet covers a large span from mild to cloying. A 'normal' Auslese would be anything between 18 to 60 gr/l and therefore there has been a need to tell whether a wine is not quite sweet.
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| Steve Slatcher |
On Thu, 02 Sep 2004 18:27:48 GMT, Anders Tørneskog
<sredna.goksenrot@c2i.net> wrote:
>That's a difficult one, actually, because there's no legal definition of the term, even when it's an allowed one. The glossary of the well informed German website wein-plus.de puts it between dry and semi-dry as Yves says, contrary to what I have seen a
nd experienced myself in the Moselle... So even German experts seem to be confused.
>The "correct" answer is: Between semi-dry and moderately sweet (halbtrocken and lieblich). The residual sugar will then be 18-25 gr/l which fits well with various wine lists I've seen.
>The reason might be that sweet covers a large span from mild to cloying. A 'normal' Auslese would be anything between 18 to 60 gr/l and therefore there has been a need to tell whether a wine is not quite sweet.
Two additional explanations I have heard:
1) It is stylistically different from halbtrocken, rather than being
sweeter or drier. I did not get a description of the style.
2) The term was invented because it sounds nicer than halbtrocken.
Can't remember who told me number 1, but the source was reasonably
authoritative or I would not have bothered to remember it.
Number 2 was from someone representing a well-respected Mosel producer
at a tasting.
In view of all the confusion, and because my source had nothing to
gain by the explanation (he was offering feinherb wines for tasting),
I am tempted to believe my number 2!
--
Steve Slatcher
http://pobox.com/~steve.slatcher
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| Anders Tørneskog |
"Anders Tørneskog" <sredna.goksenrot@c2i.net> skrev i melding
news:ECJZc.1269$8c.113587@juliett.dax.net...
>Hi
>That's a difficult one...
May I add that the word 'herb' actually does not originally describe any
degree of taste but rather the mouth puckering effect of tannin which imho
gets more noticeable with low sweetness. The meaning has later changed into
a common description for wines with higher acidity and little residual
sugar.
Feinherb (finely 'herb') would then seem to connote a balanced wine with
structure and some soothing sweetness to overcome a higher acidity.
It seems that it will be very much up to the vintner when to use that
description...
hth
Anders
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| Yves T. |
Thanks for your advice,
I guess that there's only one way to find out, i.e. learning by doing
(=tasting)!
Yves
"Anders Tørneskog" <sredna.goksenrot@c2i.net> wrote in message
news:PCLZc.1284$8c.114087@juliett.dax.net...
>
> "Anders Tørneskog" <sredna.goksenrot@c2i.net> skrev i melding
> news:ECJZc.1269$8c.113587@juliett.dax.net...
> >Hi
> >That's a difficult one...
>
> May I add that the word 'herb' actually does not originally describe any
> degree of taste but rather the mouth puckering effect of tannin which imho
> gets more noticeable with low sweetness. The meaning has later changed
into
> a common description for wines with higher acidity and little residual
> sugar.
> Feinherb (finely 'herb') would then seem to connote a balanced wine with
> structure and some soothing sweetness to overcome a higher acidity.
> It seems that it will be very much up to the vintner when to use that
> description...
> hth
> Anders
>
>
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| Michael Pronay |
"Anders Tørneskog" <sredna.goksenrot@c2i.net> wrote:
> May I add that the word 'herb' actually does not originally
> describe any degree of taste
For still wines yes, but not for sparklers, where "herb" is the
official term in German for "brut".
M.
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