RIESLING Grand Cru HENGST - L'Exception 2006

The name of HENGST means stallion.

From mid-December through to the middle of March temperatures remained close to zero. Wintercame to a dramatic end in March with a dump of 60 cm of snow – something not seen since 1954. Easter wasdamp and cold and Spring finally arrived in the middle of April. Under good conditions in May, the vines pushedforth well. The June weather allowed for a successful flowering which was finished by the 23rd. July wasextremely hot (36ºC) and dry. Some areas suffered from the dry spell but the rain arrived at the beginning ofAugust and fell intermittently through the month (133 mm). Thanks to the biodynamic cultivation of Josmeyer’svines, they survived well despite these climatic variations and the grapes reached good maturity in time for theplanned harvest on 18th September. Less fortunately heavy rain fell on the 17th (28 mm) followed by anotherdownpour on the 24th (21 mm) and again on 2nd October (65 mm in 2 days) which made it a singularlycomplicated harvest and meant that a fairly severe selection of the grapes was required to adhere to the highstandards set out by the domain.

The soil of the 360 meter high slope which dominates this vineyard is essentially a mixture oflimestone from the Vosges, chalky marl (14% active) and layers of red, brown, green and beige sedimenthundreds of meters thick. The mother rock is of an orange - yellow hue. Dating as far back as the Jurassic periodthe elements vary in density from very fine to very course. The Ph factor is within 7.8 to 8.3. This Grand Cru is130.95 acres (53,02 Ha) of vines. The combined calcareous and marl soils tend to produce rich full bodied wines.In their youth they have an untamed character, reminiscent of the vineyard's name - "stallion". They slowlymature to astonishing aromatics and fabulous richness.

The grapes were hand picked and whole-bunch pressed very slowly and gently in pneumaticpresses over 5-8 hours to give a clean must and a beneficial amount of skin contact. Transferred to thermoregulatedstainless steel tanks the juice then began a natural fermentation using only its own natural yeast whichlasted for one month. The fermentation was initially temperature controlled but was eventually allowed toproceed at its own pace to allow the wine to develop its own character and complexity. The wine stabilized instainless steel tanks naturally during the winter season and, following a very gentle filtering, was bottled in March2007 before the heat of summer to preserve the natural carbonic gas (a natural anti-oxidant). Malolacticfermentation is always avoided at Josmeyer and no chaptalization takes place.