The Teutonic Chronic: Because Provence is for rookies
2018 Ökonomierat Rebholz
Pinot Noir Rosé
(Normally $30.)
Our price: Only $25! Buy here!
Only $22 on 6! Buy here!
And only $19 on 12! Buy here!
TL; DR: Case up on of the sexiest rosés, from any country, in the entire store... for the lowest price by far in the US! (Even in NYC, where European wines often cost less, this currently runs $30!)
A few years back, Jon Bonné, Chief Wine Critic for the SF Chronicle, set off a firestorm. (Well, to the extent that any article about pink wine can be a "firestorm," anyway; the Middle East peace process this ain't!)
In an article called, "This is Where the World's Best Rosés Are Hiding," he launched a shot across the bow of ships all along the Mediterranean Sea, and said that — everyone's St. Tropez dreams to the contrary? — Provence was not the place to look for rosé.
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"What if there was a place where rosé was still being taken very seriously, made by some of the world’s most skilled winemakers and produced from grapes grown with the utmost care? Turns out there are two: Austria and Germany. What we’ll call Teutonic Rosé has caught traction - as relief from the growing fatigue with insipid pink wine.
"We like to think of rosé being from warm places, Mediterranean places.... But if you think of rosé this way, well, stop! As a group, rosés from Austria and Germany are some of the best: Our recent tasting not only far surpassed the results from any panel of Provençal rosé we’ve done in recent years, but it was frankly the best tasting we’ve done in at least a year."
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Jon's whole article can be found here (and we have his favorite "Classic" in stock, too!). But one of the wines he put in his highest category (aka, "The Stars")? Was Rebholz. And we weren't surprised! You can scarcely find an article about Hansjorg Rebholz that doesn't refer to him as a genius... and as it turns out? It runs in the family!
Hansjorg's great-grandfather, Eduard, was a scientist who experimented with the art of winemaking his whole life. At a time when all of post-war Europe was leaning towards increasingly industrial methods? (I.e., chemicals in the vineyard, additives in the wine.) The Rebholz estate was one of the very first German wineries to return to traditional organic farming and vinification.
The vineyards of Rebholz, o'erbrimming with life
In fact: as far back as 1951 (!), Eduard Rebholz (who received the title Ökonomierat, an honorary title given to Germany's greatest agriculturists, commented on his natural approach - in a way that sounds more like 2021 than 1951:
"You will receive only natural wine from my cellar, wine that is the result of intense and loving cultivation of the vines and of similar vinicultural methods (no chaptalization, no artificial addition of a Süßreserve, or similar fundamental structural changes that alter the native character of the wine and, in my eyes, mean that it is no longer a natural product." 
The Rebholz estate: family-owned and family-driven
70 years later, under Hansjorg's stewardship, the estate is now certified biodynamic... and the wines have quite simply never been better. Once a kind of "insider’s" estate, they've of late attracted a cult following — especially in New York, where somms and critics no longer think of them as merely "great German wine" but as great wine, period —comparable in their grand cru incarnations to anything produced in the world. (As one somm there said, "Everything Rebholz makes is organic, everything is dry, and everything is worth tasting.")
Lauded the world over for making wines of purity and place,
their most famous cuvée may indeed be their long-lived Pinot Noir rosé. Elegant and sexy-pants as all heck, the wine opens with a nose of spices, petrichor, and pomegranate. On the palate, cherry, grapefruit pith, and apple blossoms all begin to bloom, and the whole is shot through with real mineral verve.
Massively versatile, this is as fun to drink on its own in the park as it is with just about anything you can throw at it on your dinner table, from spicy Thai salads to roast chicken and more. (And, in contrast to everything you've ever been mistaught about rosé, the wines are also renowned for their aging potential!)
A perennial Wine Enthusiast "Editor's Choice," it normally costs $29-30. Our price on one is $25 (that's 17% off on 1!)... but given that we're offering it for an insane 37% off on the case? This is a wine that you'll want to drink all summer long! (Have a couple bottles left over in the fall? Hot damn is this gonna be the star of your Thanksgiving table!)
2018 Ökonomierat Rebholz
Pinot Noir Rosé
(Normally $30.)
Our price: Only $25! Buy here!
Only $22 on 6! Buy here!
And only $19 on 12! Buy here!