2019 Meyer-Fonné Pinot Gris Grand Cru Kaefferkopf
VARIETAL: Pinot Gris
REGION: Alsace, FR
VITICULTURE: Organic
WINEMAKER: Félix Meyer
The tour of Alsace's best white wine vineyards takes an intriguing turn here: the Kaefferkopf vineyard, famed since the 1300's - straddles the long hillside between the village of Ammerschwihr and Meyer-Fonné’s winery in nearby Katzenthal. From this special terroir of sandstone marl, Félix Meyer produces both Riesling and Pinot Gris with stunning complexity and age-worthiness. One hallmark of wines from Kaefferkopf is that the soil signature is usually even stronger than the variety. This 2019 is wonderful —fermented dry (4.5 grams RS), full-bodied in style, I can't think of much better at the table in a multitude of gastronomic settings as this has a kaleidoscopic range.
"Our vineyards are now mostly located on the hillsides, so the historic part of the Alsatian vineyards", says Félix. Only about 25% of the current holdings of 14 hectares of vines are located in the valley floor and are exclusively planted with either Pinot Blanc or Auxerrois. All the noble grape varieties, however, are cultivated in historic vineyards in the hillsides, which give predominantly dry and nervy, terroir-driven wines full of expression and mineral tension. There are no less than five Grand Cru vineyards—Kaefferkopf, Wineck-Schlossberg, Sporen, Furstentum and Schoenenbourg—that are organically farmed and cultivated and they all give deep, racy and firmly structured wines that intermix ripe fruit flavors and seductive textures with a vital and mineral backbone.
The winemaking is very traditional here, since most of the investments have been made in the low-yielding vineyards, with top old-vines parcels in the best sites, high density plantings and the vitalization of the soils. No synthetic fertilizers, herbicides or pesticides are used at all. The fermentation of the naturally cleared musts takes place with native yeasts in either stainless steel or traditional oak, and after racking, the wines are kept on the lees until May (Alsace AOC) and respectively September (single vineyards) before bottling.