This for me is one of the *great* GREAT white wine deals in the world – within the German pantheon it is right there with Keller’s “von der Fels” and Emrich-Schönleber’s “Mineral” as truly Grand Cru wines that sell for 50% of what they probably should.
There’s a story here, so make a quick cup of coffee and sit for a moment.
The wine is called “Senior” as a tribute to Florian’s grandfather who was already in the 1950s famous at least in the Saar Valley for his dry Riesling. So the story goes, he would walk through the cellar and taste all the barrels and then write “Senior” on the cask he wanted for his own drinking. Nine times out of ten, the cask he took was good ole “Fass, or barrel, #6,” sourced from parcels in the western-most part of the Kupp. As it happens, this wine nearly always ferments to a precarious, near-impossible-to-describe balance, in this gray area that is not at all sweet, but not legally dry either. I refer to this style of wine as “dry tasting.” In the old days, “dry” Saar wines often needed a little bit of residual sugar, not to make them taste fruity, but to just counter the ferocious acidities. So this is “Senior” not only named after Florian’s grandfather, but after an old-school style of wines common for the Saar.
You just have to taste this wine; while it normally ferments to off dry levels, the wine is dry tasting yet textural with amazing depth and clarity. Don’t worry about how dry or not it is – it’s just delicious. Focus on that.