DW, editor: Iosifina Tsagalidou

“It’s like testing a dinosaur. With climate change, you can’t make these wines again.”

In a suit and tie, Dieter Greiner talks to about ten winemakers in a wood-paneled room.

They sit at the tables that are set up across the room. In front of them are each nine wine glasses, each with a sip of the amber Riesling also known as Eiswein (ice wine), which dates back to 1981.

Because of rising temperatures, Germany since 2012 has been unable to produce this type of cold-weather Riesling, says Greiner as his guests sniff and swirl their glasses.

The German wine expert is the managing director of Kloster Eberbach, a former Cistercian abbey still known today for its wine production. So a special tasting event was organized there for selected winemakers from all over Europe to taste 101 vintages of German Riesling, which dates back to 1893.

“The idea is to draw attention to German wine and German culture as a whole,” says German winemaker and sommelier Ralf Frenzel in an interview with DW before the start of the event. This ‘G20 of wine’, as he called it, is a collaboration between the abbey and the wine magazine ‘Fine’.

He hopes the event will thus help expand Germany’s culinary image abroad to include more than just beer and sauerkraut.

Over the last 40 years, German winemakers and sommeliers have worked hard to revive the world-class reputation of German wine as it was before the First World War, when Germany was a popular holiday destination for the European nobility.

However, the German politicians invited by Frenzel are absent from the event.

2022, the hottest year in Germany

If the event were held in Paris, the president of France himself would be there to open the ceremony, Frenzel says.

Germany, however, does not pride itself enough on the quality of its wines.

“Politicians could do a lot more, especially abroad to convey German quality, because it’s really great.” The energy crisis and inflation may be one reason why politicians are reluctant to attend a luxury event.

During the ensuing discussions an Austrian winemaker asks a German what his industry is doing to prepare for climate change.

According to a report by the International Organization of Vine and Wine in 2023, France and Italy represent 11% and 10% respectively of the world’s vineyard surface, while Germany only 1.2%. But Germany does a lot with a little.

In 2022 it was the world’s 9th largest wine producer and the only EU country to increase its wine production level last year, a success attributed to the hot and dry growing season. 2022 was the warmest year for Germany since temperature records began in 1881.

The industry must seize the opportunity

During the tasting there is silence, everyone is focused as if they are writing an exam. In the afternoon they are guided to the vineyards of Eberbach. Last year the German vineyards along the Rhine had no rain for two and a half months.

“We’ve never seen this before,” Greiner declares during the tour, to mixed reactions. “I believe, like many people in France, that global warming is good (for wine),” declares a French winemaker. “Wine has never been better.”

“For now,” adds another. Greiner says they face new challenges but the overall quality is higher. Asked by DW about rising temperatures as an opportunity for winemaking, Lebanese winemaker Mark Hohar of Chateau Musar says: “There is a change, there’s no doubt, that’s why some are affected more than others and some benefit.”

He points out that the quality of German and English sparkling wines is improving, while the southernmost countries are suffering.

On the second day of the event, wines bottled in 1910, 1905 and 1901 are served.

The tasters burst into applause. Many of these professionals have rarely drunk wine this old. They had the opportunity to taste the oldest wine in the country, from 1893.

Frenzel points out that in the future there is an opportunity to produce great German wines, especially with climate conditions in Germany’s favor, at least for now. But the German wine industry must work hard to seize the opportunity and avoid complacency with what it has achieved.