2023 Keller Muskateller Trocken Landwein 

...Julia and Klaus Peter just couldn't help themselves.

Among the many things I respect so much about the Keller estate is that as much as they push forward, they also never lose sight of tradition.

And so it was that while they began planting their new sites in the Rheinhessen's Zellertal with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, they also planted a tiny parcel of Muskateller.

This is a grape they have both loved as it speaks to a very particular history, a very specific quality of German wine. Julia, one should remember, studied at Müller-Catoir with Hans-Günther Schwartz back in the day. (Yet the Muskateller for this offer is Trocken, it's dry, more on this below.)

This is their first-ever production from these vines; a scant 500 or so bottles for the universe. 

Here is likely your one chance to capture it.

It is hard to contextualize a wine like this, because it is at once so traditional and so boundary-breaking - thus the "tradition of pushing boundaries" line above.

Let's start with the location, because if you've been paying attention to the Keller narrative over the last five years, you know the family has acquired and planted parcels in the Rheinhessen's Zellertal, an area about ten minutes south and west of their hometown Flörsheim-Dalsheim. It is a very cool, windswept valley and the family has made the very expensive, very time-intensive and very labor-intensive choice to plant the vines - Pinot Noir and Chardonnay - at up to 18,000 vines a hectare.

Yet in one of these parcels, right at the top, they simply couldn't resist planting some Muskateller.

With the first real harvest from these vines, they weren't sure what to do. Julia had her ideas, KP his and Felix his. And so they tried different things. About a third was fermented on the skins, a third saw just a bit of skin contact, and roughly a third was direct pressed. Muskateller is fragrant and aromatic, it can be intense, it can be light or dense, airy or rather plush. In other words, it can be a lot of things and they wanted to learn about what this new parcel of Muskateller had to say.

After trying each of the wines, they decided to do an equal blend, to see how it worked together; and this was the uncontested star of the show. It was no question.

It is a singular wine, in some ways grandiose, ambitious, extraordinary... and in other ways, simply a pure, mineral-water inspired beverage that recalls gardens and rainstorms, dark, shade-dappled mountain streams.

Keller makes (and has made) a project out of shaping extraordinary, terroir-driven wines from grapes that are often more known for their exoticism and perfume. Anyone who has had their dry Scheurebe, the lucky few, know the thrilling precision they can coax out of these more aromatic grapes.

This is one of those wines.

Bone dry, and clocking in at only 10% alcohol, the wine is racy, bouncy, needle-fine and incisive, superbly detailed with citrus and a sweet-spicy florality, like orange blossoms and lavender, freshly cut tulip stalks and lilac. Yet the wine has restraint, focus, a lovely and polished mineral spine, even a good amount of salinity crackling around.

It walks a fine, fine line...  freshness and exuberance.

This is only a first chapter, but it's so exciting. Grab your part of this delicious history.

This offer is now closed. If you need help finding the wines please email orders@sourcematerialwine.com.