International Pinot Noir Tasting, London 2011

German Pinot Noir came up trumps at a recent International Pinot Noir tasting, with seven of the judges top 10 wines coming from Germany. The blind tasting, which was judged by a world-class panel of wine experts including Jancis Robinson MW, Xavier Rousset MS and Peter McCombie MW, was organised by the German Wine Institute and chaired by Tim Atkin MW.

The objective of the tasting was to draw attention to the fact that Germany is the third largest producer of Pinot Noir in the world and to highlight the top quality of German Pinot Noir.

The top-placed German wine was the 2008 Winzerhof Thörle Spätburgunder Hölle from the Pfalz, which came in third position behind Oregon's 2009 Anticaterra Pinot Noir and the Californian 2008 Au Bon Climat Isabelle.

Blind Pinot Noir tasting, London: Ten wine growing nations compete - Germany with seven wines amoung Top10 video: setting the scene for German Pinot Noir

The other top-placed German wines included the 2009 Rudolf Fürst Centgrafenberg Spätburgunder, 2007 Ziereisen Spätburgunder Jaspis Alte Reben, 2008 Gutzler Westhofener Morstein Spätburgunder, 2008 Ziereisen Spätburgunder Schulen, 2009 Jean Stodden Alte Reben Spätburgunder and 2009 Heitlinger GmbH Königsbecher Spätburgunder.

The event was the brain child of Tim Atkin and Hamish Anderson who visited Germany last year and were so impressed by the quality of the Pinot Noirs they tasted that they challenged the German Wine Institute to hold a comparative tasting, pitting German Pinot Noir against some of the world's most revered Pinot Noir producers from Burgundy, New Zealand and Oregon, among others. They then returned to the Rheingau in September this year for a pre-tasting, tasting over 300 German Pinot Noirs in order to select the top 20. The Pinot Noirs from non-German producers were also selected by Tim Atkin, following a recent visit to the International Pinot Noir Celebration in Oregon.

As Steffen Schindler, marketing director for the German Wine Institute, observed: "The UK is one of our major markets abroad for German wine, so it's great to raise the profile of our Pinot Noirs here. In this tasting, German Pinot Noirs outscored New Zealand, Australia, Burgundy, Oregon, Austria and California combined so we hope this will go some way to demonstrating that German Pinot Noirs really can compete with the best in the world for quality!"

The judges that took part in the tasting were: Tim Atkin MW, Hamish Anderson, Jancis Robinson MW, Xavier Rousset MS, Christine Parkinson, Peter McCombie MW, Anthony Rose, Gearoid Devaney MS, Ronan Sayburn, Stephen Brook, Matthew Jukes, Stephan Reinhardt

Stephan Reinhardt is one of the most profiled wine journalists in Germany. He writes for wine publications such as Weinwisser, The World of Fine Wine or Der Feinschmecker, and also for many leading German newspapers such as Süddeutsche Zeitung, Welt am Sonntag and die tageszeitung.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Pinot Noir
• Spätburgunder