Wine · Medium strength
Dry Riesling
Lime, slate, and electricity — the sommelier's not-so-secret favorite.
How to order it: German Kabinett trocken or Australian Eden Valley. Screams with spicy food.
Flavor profile
The proper serve
- Chill to 45–50°F
- Standard white glass
- Look for 'trocken' on German labels
- Pairs: spicy food, pork, Thai
- Ages brilliantly if you can wait
The story
Riesling has been documented along the Rhine since the fifteenth century, and by the nineteenth, the great wines of the Mosel and Rheingau fetched prices that rivaled and sometimes exceeded first-growth Bordeaux. Then the twentieth century happened to it: oceans of sugary Liebfraumilch taught two generations that German wine meant cheap and sweet, and the noblest white grape in the world spent decades in exile. The rehabilitation came through trocken — dry — bottlings from Germany, plus bone-dry renditions from Alsace and Australia's Clare and Eden Valleys. Sommeliers never stopped believing; its acidity, transparency to site, and ability to age for half a century make it their perennial answer to almost any question.
Adjacent pours