2015 Lauer Riesling Fass No. 2 "Extra Trocken" - $50

The photo above shows a bottle of 2015 Lauer Fass 2 "Extra Trocken" that I opened with Florian Lauer at a Rieslingfeier after-party just a few weeks ago.

I have cellared, for the better part of a decade, roughly seven cases of this wine, waiting for what I consider nearly a mystic moment: the ten-year mark.

Today, after fulfilling the promise I made to myself, I offer this humble parcel - the rare chance to taste one of Lauer's most severe bottlings, with age. If you are interested, please click here to purchase - but also realize we only have 76 bottles to sell and so we may allocate just to spread the love as widely as possible.

But let me explain all of this just a bit more.
 
The last Rieslingfeier Lauer had come to was in 2018 and he brought with him a case of older wines from the cellar. A small selection of these bottles we opened at a casual industry lunch before Rieslingfeier, just to show off the new releases compared to some older wines. And so it was that a 2008 Fass 2 "Extra Trocken" was opened - always one of my favorite wines due to its severity - exactly ten years post-vintage.

It was a hallowed experience; the bottle was transcendent.

I still remember Florian and I looking at each other, shocked by the mineral-water purity of the wine, its still-severe form, for sure, but the decade of rest had polished the edges and given the wine a minty, herbal edge to it - something I note a lot in the best aged Saar and Ruwer wines. There is something for me that is so heartbreaking in a wine that is not per se "grand," that doesn't set out to run you over with flavor and intensity - a humble wine in fact - that given the time to develop, rewards so exponentially.

This 2008 "Extra Trocken" was a bottle Lauer and I talked about the whole weekend... and into the coming years.

Low and behold sometime after this (I honestly cannot remember how long but I think only a matter of months), a distributor of ours found themselves with just a bit too much inventory and as we needed wine, well, we agreed to buy back some cases. And in this grouping of wines there were around seven cases of 2015 Lauer Fass 2 - I couldn't believe it.

Even before we got the wine back I knew what I had to do: Cellar the wine for ten years post-vintage, to give the wine the time it needed. I was not going to forget the lesson of that 2008 opened in 2018.

And so, the wine was shoved into the darkest corner of the cellar and I marked my calendar: 2025.

And now here we are. I know this is all a small affair, ridiculous even. Yet these are cases I've walked by so often in the cellar, thinking both simultaneously of the past, of this 2008, and of the future - back when 2025 seemed a long way away, and when I questioned my own sanity, or business savvy, or both, for cellaring the wine for so long.

I don't hear people speak all that much of the joy of the journey, yet for me this has been rewarding in and of itself. And now, to be able to share, to give a few people a little sunshine, a smile, makes it all worthwhile.

This is admittedly a small offer, but it's a big deal for us.

Thank you so much for the support!

To order please email orders@sourcematerialwine.com.