Region: Burgenland, Austria

Varietal: 100% Pinot Gris

Tasting notes: The 2019 Pinot Gris Trocken offers an intense and elegant bouquet with ripe fruit and sur lie aromas intertwined with lovely oaky nuances. Elegant and fresh on the palate, this is a medium-bodied and refined Pinot Gris with a lean, elegant and refreshing body. This wine hides the warm vintage brilliantly on the palate, but it's not unripe either.

Producer: In the late 1980s and up to his early death in 2007, Alois Kracher handcrafted some of the greatest noble sweet wines of the world. His annual collections of numbered TBAs became legends and were often presented along with the finest sweet wines from Sauternes (namely Château d’Yquem), Tokaji (Szepsi) and Mosel-Saar-Ruwer (Egon Müller, Joh. Jos. Prüm). Alois’s son Gerhard Kracher has managed to maintain the extremely high level of quality. Although sweet wines have long been Kracher’s forte, today its dry wines are earning considerable acclaim, with its Pinot Gris, Welschreisling and Zweigelt gaining an enthusiastic following for quality and outstanding value.

Vineyard and Winemaking: The Seewinkel is an area in the Burgenland region of eastern Austria, approximately 20 km wide, along the eastern shore of Lake Neusiedl. It is an immense plain, with countless shallow lakes of various sizes scattered throughout it. Most of these lakes, including the largest, Lake Neusiedl, are less than two metres deep. The Pannonian (continental) climate brings hot dry summers and very cold winters and it is these extremes that create a unique climate for viticulture. During cool autumn evenings, evaporation from the numerous lakes creates heavy fog, which covers the area until midday when the still strong sunlight burns through.