Wine · Medium strength
Grüner Veltliner
White pepper and green apple — Austria's zippy answer to everything.
How to order it: The sommelier handshake. Famously friendly with vegetables, even asparagus.
Flavor profile
The proper serve
- Chill to 45–50°F
- White wine glass
- Famously vegetable-friendly
- Pairs: asparagus, schnitzel, sushi
- Look for Austrian 'Federspiel' or 'Smaragd'
The story
Austria's signature grape carries the scars of the country's strangest wine chapter: the 1985 scandal in which a handful of brokers were caught adulterating sweet wines with diethylene glycol. Exports collapsed overnight, and Austria responded by writing some of the strictest wine laws in Europe and rebuilding around quality — with peppery, precise Grüner Veltliner from the Wachau, Kamptal, and Kremstal leading the recovery. Vindication arrived in 2002, when a celebrated London blind tasting saw top Grüners outscore grand cru white Burgundies, to considerable embarrassment all around. White pepper, green apple, lentil-and-radish savor: it is the rare grape whose comeback story is also its country's.
Adjacent pours