This is not the wine I had planned to review first. So how did it end up being the one? For reasons I can’t remember, I was browsing The Wine Society’s website. And I saw this wine. So I immediately ordered a case of six. Why? Because, in my experience, it’s a simple, but charming wine, and one that is almost impossible to find outside of Austria. When Julia and I visited Domaine Wachau a few years ago, they didn’t initially include the Steinfeder in their tasting for us. It’s the local wine, it’s a simple wine, they told us. Yet that is sometimes what you want. I’m predisposed to like this wine, and it is thus with some trepidation that I finally unscrewed the bottle to try this.
In the glass, it’s a very pale lemon, crystal clear. You can easily see through it. It’s nice, but nothing remarkable. About what I expected, really.
On the nose – nothing. I try again. Perhaps a faint hint of lemon. Then again, I’m expecting if I can smell anything, it will be citrus, since I’m familiar with the type of wine. So maybe I’m imagining it.
So far, this doesn’t seem all that promising. Pleasant if unremarkable colour, and nothing on the nose. Time to take a taste. It’s very easy to drink. The first sip goes down before I know it, before I really have time to think much about the wine. Refreshing and zesty, it has nice, well-balanced, if not very strong, acidity. It almost seems to have a hint of petillance. That’s a promising sign.
Since I found the first taste to be so drinkable, I have to have some more, to pay more attention to how it feels in the mouth. It turns out that the wine just sits there, contentedly. (No, I’m not really sure how to tell if a wine is content.) It’s not a demanding wine that you need to work at to appreciate, or unravel its complexity. The Steinfeder is light bodied, and relatively low in alcohol. It’s refreshing. There’s some lemon and possible other citrus, maybe some hay on the taste.
It has an extremely long finish. Long after (as in minutes) I’ve actually drank the wine, I can still feel it lingering in the mouth, a fresh and refreshing hint of lemon. ‘Just lingers and lingers’ my notes say. This, I’ll admit, is surprising. For a reasonably priced wine that’s meant for local consumption, I wouldn’t typically expect such a long finish. Not that I’m complaining, mind. It’s a definite plus.
Refreshing, zesty, citrus. The three words that show up most in my notes on tasting this wine. That’s a good assessment of it. It’s not a serious wine. It’s not meant to be. The description a friend once used for another wine springs to mind: ‘Good for uncomplicated drinking.’ It’s meant to be drunk young, within a year or two. It won’t age. But for a wine to sit and drink on a summer’s afternoon, it more than does the job.
Rating: This is a definite yummy to yummy+ wine for me.
Sustainability: The wine is certified by Sustainable Austria. It is a relatively new programme, but worth checking out. In short, they aim to cover and evaluate three ‘key factors’ of sustainability: ecology, economy, and society. It thus ranges from issues like grape growing to fair wages and promoting regionality.
Other stuff: The Wachau region in Austria uses its own classification system, and there are three levels based on what is known as ‘must weight.’ This refers to the sugar content of the grape juice before it is fermented. Steinfeder is the ‘lowest,’ followed by Federspiel, which is probably the most common to find in the UK, and Smaragd, which is meant to be the really serious stuff. I won’t go into all the specifics of the classifications, but if you are interested, you can read about them here.
Grüner Veltliner is Austria’s most commonly grown grape. It makes wines that range from this to the seriously weighty, capable of long aging. It’s gaining recognition and popularity outside of Austria, and not before time.
The technical info and such: Purchased from The Wine Society, at £9.50 / bottle. 11.5% ABV. Sustainable. Vegan. Drink now.