Blaufrankisch: The Best Red You’ve Never Heard Of

October 27, 2010

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In 1993 Englebert Prieler, an Austrian vintner, decided for the first time to bottle a single-vineyard wine from the grape variety Blaufränkisch. When it came time to sell the wine, he priced it the same as his better known Cabernet Sauvignon. However, the Blaufränkisch bottles languished unsold until a Swiss collector bought them all as a block. Adding insult to injury, the asking price at the winery was only 20 schillings (about 1.50 euro) a bottle.

Things have changed. The 2006 vintage of that same wine, a fuller style of Blaufränkisch, now sells for about $130 per bottle in the U.S.

While Blaufränkisch is hardly a household wine term, it has risen from nothing in 1995 to, well, more than nothing. During that time, growers in eastern Austria, the grape’s ancestral home, have started to take care with the grape to plant it in good sites, reduce yields and stop blending it with other varieties.

It was a smart move. I tasted through over a dozen of the top examples at a recent event organized by David Schildknecht, critic and writer for Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate. Schildknecht suggested that Blaufränkisch is one of the grapes that most transparently reflects the soil and setting where the vine grows but, in non-wine-nerd terms, it’s a grape that delivers in many styles and, thus, could have broad appeal.

When I asked winemaker Roli Velich of the Moric winery which grape was the most apt comparison for Blaufränkisch, he suggested no fewer than three: pinot noir from Burgundy, Syrah from the Northern Rhone and Nebbiolo from Piedmont. I could see the blend of finesse, power and aromatic intrigue that he invoked across the wines that afternoon.

For example, Velich’s old vine 2002 Neckenmarkt ($85, if you can find it), aged 22 months in small, old oak barrels, had an herbal lift to the mature fruits on the aroma and fine tannins that actually could probably age for quite a while longer.

Source: http://www.forbes.com/2010/02/04/austria-red-wine-lifestyle-wine-blaufrankisch-tyler-colman.html

Clark Wine Center was built in 2003 by Hong Kong-based Yats International Leisure Philippines to become the largest wine shop in Philippines supplying Asia’s wine lovers with fine vintage wines at attractive prices.  Today, this wine shop in Clark Philippines offers over 2000 selections of fine wines from all major wine regions in the world.  As a leading wine supplier in Philippines, Pampanga’s Clark Wine Center offers an incomparable breadth of vintages, wines from back vintages spanning over 50 years.  Clark Wine Center is located in Pampanga Clark Freeport Zone adjacent to Angeles City, just 25 minutes from Subic and 45 minutes from Manila.

Wines from Burgundy, Bordeaux, Rhone, Loire, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Austria, Alsace, USA, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, South Africa, Chile and Argentina etc. are well represented in this Clark Wine Shop.

For more information, email Wine@Yats-International.com or visit http://www.ClarkWineCenter.com