Markus Molitor
Wehlener Klosterberg Riesling Auslese ***
Mosel
2021

The producer

Markus is the 8^th generation winemaker in the Molitor family and took over the family winery in the mid-1980s. Based in Wehlener Klosterberg, 95% of production today is Riesling, with land in 15 vineyards across the finest of Mosel and Saar. 

The estate received worldwide attention and instant fame in 2015 when three of their Auslese Rieslings from the 2013 vintage received 100-point ratings from Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate, and Markus was nicknamed “Herr 300 Punkte” (Mr 300 Points).

The bottle neck capsules are colour coded according to the style of the wine, with white capsules denoting dry wines, grey-green capsules off-dry wines, and finally sweet and botrytised wines have gold capsules.  

The wine

Made from 80-year-old vines, Wehlen Riesling is one of the finest in the Mosel, characterized by a terroir whose slate composition imparts a mineral and complex character to the wine. Following late harvests in November, the grapes are macerated and fermented in wooden barrels with wild yeasts, then aged for a long time on its lees, enhancing its depth and complexity.

We choose our wines based on a range of criteria (see how we choose our wines) of which critic scores is just one. Rather than simply highlight the best score to promote a wine, our average critic score is calculated from the scores provided by several respected wine critics, who we follow for specific regions. They do not represent all critic scores and, wherever possible, we try and give more weight to more recent reviews. Where appropriate we consider market-based scores like Global Wine Score or Wine Searcher Average scores.

As a rule, we look to offer wines that achieve a 92/100 average critic score or better and frankly a lot of very good wines simply don’t make the cut. As a high-end provider we want to reflect that positioning in the quality of wines we offer. Such wines are only a tiny fraction of those generally on offer in the market. We believe that an average score is a more conservative and representative approach, but it is still subjective and only offered as a guide to our customers, who will (and should) do their own research. We will add individual critic scores to our website in the future.