Austria Pure Wine Motion — The place to Drink

“Austria’s Tuscany” was my vacation spot: the wine area of Sudsteiermark, or Southern Styria, within the foothills alongside the Slovenian border. However on this small nation recognized for alpine sports activities, excessive tradition, and Weiner schnitzel, all roads result in Vienna. So the day earlier than I set out on a spring driving tour of wine nation, I discovered myself within the imperial metropolis, opening the home windows at Lodge Sacher to soak up the scrumptious climate. My elegant suite was a composition of eau de Nil wall material, ecru silk curtains, and molded paneling in eggshell hues, and it gave me an thought to check out over dinner. 

At a relaxed farm-to-table bistro close by (Restaurant Schubert, sadly now closed), the twenty-something proprietor seated me on the terrace and recommended I let him deal with the ordering. I agreed, and requested him to additionally select two Austrian wines. My thought, I defined, was to match one “traditional” from a landmark Austrian vineyard, one thing within the faultless Lodge Sacher method, with an equal “pure” wine. The proprietor’s eyes lit up. He knew what to do. (There is no such thing as a precise definition, however usually wines offered as pure, or low-intervention, come from natural or biodynamic grapes fermented with wild yeast and handled with minimal sulfur.) 

Out got here a development of lovely seasonal dishes. White asparagus with grilled romaine and diced rhubarb in a pool of pea emulsion. A frilly salad of sheer carrot ribbons. Delicately poached salmon trout. Jerusalem-artichoke sorbet with preserved quince for dessert. It was a culinary sketch of springtime in Austria: the style of nature, and an ideal counterpoint to the refinement of the Lodge Sacher.

As for the wines, there was a misunderstanding. The proprietor introduced me two glasses — for every course. Eight tremendous wines in whole, each considered one of them elegant and exact. And from every pairing, certainly, I most popular the pure wine. Why? That they had attraction, individuality, sprint. They had been enjoyable, however not within the matted means of many pure wines I’d tried previously. 

I texted the outcomes of my experiment to Marko Kovac, cofounder of Karakterre, the natural-wine honest in Eisenstadt that was to be the ultimate cease on my itinerary. 

“What have you ever individuals carried out to my palate?” I teased. “There’s no going again,” he replied.

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Austria’s Strategy to Pure Wine

To every his personal, after all, and a few drinkers will at all times want the classical fashion. However what I found on the natural-wine route by way of Southern Styria and adjoining Burgenland — areas recognized, respectively, for fresh-as-springwater whites and reds nimbler than a Strauss waltz — is that Austria just isn’t a cool place, wine-wise. The low-intervention bottles I sampled had been faultless and refined, with not one of the barnyard aromas, kombucha fizz, and sour-grape tang tolerated by vintners in different, much less exacting corners of the world. By the tip of the journey, it occurred to me that Austria could be the world’s most approachable gateway to pure wine.

Occasionally, I put down my glass to soak within the historical past of those culturally wealthy borderlands, which had been as soon as not on the edge however in the course of a European superpower. “Austria used to go all the way in which south to Trieste,” one sommelier jogged my memory. Austro-Hungary’s Hapsburg dynasty had counted Styria amongst its possessions since 1278; on the eve of World Battle I, it dominated as a constitutional monarchy over such far-flung cities as Trieste, Budapest, Prague, Kraków, and Sarajevo. 

Sources, concepts, and influences from throughout the realm entered the nation’s cultural DNA. I stored catching glimpses of elsewhere within the meals, the palaces, the polychrome church buildings, the stone village homes, the timber farms — every a hint of that cosmopolitan empire.

Much more vivid than the area’s historical past was the glowing presence of nature. Southern Austria was in full flower throughout my journey: lilac and elder within the forested Styrian hills, honey locust and wild rose on the plains of Burgenland, a perfumed panorama that rushed in by way of my open automobile window. In every single place I used to be met with the bloom of well being. At little taverns, backyard pickings stuffed the menus, and at night time the family-run inns smelled of air-dried linen. People carried themselves with a way of contentment and good humor, as in the event that they weren’t too busy to open a bottle of wine at lunch or saunter off for a day hike.

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A Go to to Graz, the Capital of Styria

Midway to Graz, the storybook capital of Styria, inexperienced hills gently gathered themselves up from the sleek plains just like the skirt of a couture ball robe. Graz was as soon as an imperial metropolis, like Vienna, nevertheless it has a distinctly southern publicity. I had the unusual sensation, as I walked into the UNESCO-designated historic heart by way of plazas planted with olive timber, that I may really feel a Mediterranean breeze. It was because the Hapsburgs wished. Within the sixteenth century they introduced in Italian architects to replace their drab medieval metropolis. Domenico dell’Allio delivered them a colonnaded palace that’s now house to the provincial parliament. On the close by central sq. a hulking city corridor, the Hauptplatz, bristles with architectural doodads like an previous Baroque pile however is virtually new, put up in 1893 by city-proud residents who paid for it with a tax on wine.

I ducked in to Gasthaus Stainzerbauer, a conventional tavern, for lunch. The every day particular was white asparagus, heat potatoes, and mâche, a small salad inexperienced, drizzled with pumpkin-seed oil, an area delicacy so intensely inexperienced it left grassy stains on my serviette. This was traditional Styrian cooking, and it could be the baseline in opposition to which I measured that night time’s dinner at Broadmoar, a countryside restaurant and inn run by modern chef Johann Schmuck. 

Though it sits barely past the Graz suburbs, Broadmoar appeared to exist on the far aspect of enchantment, in a setting of horse pastures, shadowy woods, and blooming hedgerows. I went for a stroll throughout golden hour and time appeared suspended: dandelions of their uncountable quantity had flowered, however the puffballs had not but puffed away. At dinner, Schmuck’s menu explored the exact micro season of the farm throughout 11 programs, every accompanied by low-intervention wines from small regional producers. Practically each plate was sprinkled with the wild edibles I’d seen underfoot on my stroll: oxalis, chickweed, yarrow, area garlic, rumex, bishop’s weed, cress, and nettles that stung lower than ours in the US. In contrast with lunch, this was Styria at its most pure.

A cock crowed. Throughout the valley one other answered. It was 4:21 a.m., and the skylight above my mattress was open. Quickly the sunshine rose and, with it, probably the most flamboyant birdsong I’d heard since a morning on the Serengeti a few years in the past. Among the many refrain, a cuckoo referred to as. I had by no means heard one earlier than, nevertheless it couldn’t have been the rest: it sounded precisely like a cuckoo clock. 

By some means my head felt tremendous regardless of the earlier night time’s many glasses of analysis. Pure-wine proponents declare their low-sulfur tipple causes much less of a hangover, or possibly it was only a good night time’s sleep within the super-oxygenated air. However in any case, I used to be absolutely charged to drive about 45 minutes south, almost to the border with Slovenia, to fulfill a world-renowned guru of natural-wine making, Sepp Muster, and his spouse/collaborator, Maria.

There was no mistaking the Muster vineyards. Standard administration practices suppress every thing that isn’t vine by mowing, tilling, and spraying herbicide with an depth that ranges from anal-retentive to paranoid. The Musters do the alternative. They invite in unruly nature and encourage its residency amongst their vines. I may distinguish a dozen sorts of rival wildflowers and broad-leaf vegetation within the thick grass. Pollinators buzzed previous. Swarms of smaller bugs, backlit by the morning solar, had been snatched from the air by avian patrols. 

Sepp greeted me on the steps of the couple’s gently worn 18th-century farmhouse and toured me by way of the vineyards, established on land his father acquired in 1978. “We belief each plant is rising on the best spot,” Muster mentioned of the inexperienced exuberance, “as a result of that’s the way in which nature works. If the soil is alive, every thing works.” Strong and jolly in his center years, Sepp sounded by turns like a humble farmer, a sensible ecologist, a local weather scientist, a authorities agronomist, and a Druidic excessive priest. One other secret: he doesn’t make the wine. “I’m observing,” he mentioned in succinct abstract of the whole low-intervention ethos. On this worldview, the wine is made “within the winery”: the vines themselves create a self-portrait of the yr to seize in a wine bottle. We joined Maria at a desk within the half-wild backyard, and Sepp uncorked a number of bottles. “We will really feel this complexity within the wine,” he mentioned, swirling a glass. “It’s not a bodily sensation; it’s simply very tremendous, elegant flavors.” 

The shock was that Styria has traditionally not been recognized for its tremendous wine, although grapevines had been first recorded within the space within the seventeenth century, Sepp mentioned, however on the flip of the twentieth century extra grapes had been being grown commercially on the Slovenian aspect of the border. The explanation needed to do with politics, to an extent, however principally with local weather. Styria was too chilly. A warming pattern reached a historic milestone with the right 1992 rising season. Sepp in contrast the present local weather circumstances with these of Burgundy within the 70s and 80s — wine-making Valhalla. 

That night time I stayed close by at Weingut Tauss, a vineyard and inn outdoors the village of Schlossberg run by Alice and Roland Tauss. Breakfast the subsequent morning was served open air on tablecloths the identical milky blue as the intense, humid sky. Alice Tauss put out whole-wheat bread, excellent house-made jam, and a scramble of orange-yolked eggs drizzled with the ever present pumpkin-seed oil. She moved among the many tables in a nutmeg linen skirt, an image of well being and good conscience. Roland had the acute, assessing look of a hyper-educated fowl and sported a New Wave haircut. Within the tasting room, they described their intent, as winemakers, to bottle a way of concord and “lifeness,” their time period for the spirit of biodiversity that animates the meadow-like vineyards.

“In German, winery is Weingarten, a wine backyard,” Alice advised me. “We do a whole lot of work for our place to be a backyard. For us, it’s also a harvest to see the wildflowers and listen to the birds.” 

Beneath the affect of their sleek wines, I felt myself falling in love with the day, the place, the couple’s animist spirituality, the entire bucolic imaginative and prescient. Longtime clients had the alternative response when the vineyard first went pure a decade in the past. They fled, “100%,” Roland mentioned. “On this area, individuals don’t drink our wine,” he continued, an edge in his voice. The Tausses additionally confronted scorn from conventionally minded neighbors who thought of their nonconformist strategies eccentric and probably lunatic.

I drove away with a better appreciation for the nerve proven by Styria’s pure winemakers in breaking away from the institution, with its rule books and official tasting panels that determine if a bottling can carry the label of “Qualitätswein.” A number of years again, a wine submitted by the Musters failed to fulfill all 10 high quality requirements — a truth Maria shared with a twinkle of satisfaction. 

The Remaining Leg of the Street Journey

When you can title any crimson from Austria, it’s most likely Blaufränkisch, the wine for which Burgenland — Austria’s easternmost and least populous state — is finest recognized. (Bonus factors for naming Zweigelt, the area’s different broadly planted crimson.) Historically, native growers went 50-50 on white versus crimson, defined Martin Lichtenberger, who makes wine in Breitenbrunn along with his Spanish spouse, Adriana González. The steadiness shifted within the Nineteen Eighties, because of European Union subsidies, however the couple seeks out previous plots that escaped uprooting. “Every has its personal historical past, which you respect,” Lichtenberger mentioned. “You don’t have to boost the vines anymore. However you are taking them by the hand and lead them your means.”

“We’re a bit romantic,” mentioned González of their ardour for gnarled vines set in imperfect rows. However relating to cellar work, they favor “severe” wines, that means the alternative of funky. (At Karakterre, Judith Beck, the proficient maker of whistle-clean wines, equally mentioned, unsmilingly, “I’m a severe particular person, and I take what I do very severely.”)

What Burgenland has over Styria is scale — it’s doable to go massive on this flat acreage. The one Austrian natural-wine producer whose bottles I can discover dependably in wine shops across the U.S. is Meinklang, which is headquartered on the southeastern finish of Lake Neusiedl in Pamhagen, a bottle toss from Hungary. 

The farmers behind the model, the Michlits household, have lived within the area for seven generations and now hold 200 of their roughly 6,000 acres in wine grapes. The various operation consists of grain for beer and cattle for beef, and all of it runs on ideas established by the thinker Rudolf Steiner. Born in Austro-Hungary in 1861, Steiner created biodynamics, a means of farming that mixes natural strategies (cattle manure for fertilizer) with esoteric rituals supposed to attract down cosmic energies, or one thing like that. Biodynamics is a mash-up of premodern farming traditions, neo-pagan animism, liturgical precision, and recordkeeping worthy of the papal paperwork. Name it non secular agronomy for brief — or name it whack-a-doodle nonsense — however both means, biodynamics is a power within the wine world. 

A lot of the locations I visited alongside Austria’s natural-wine route had been licensed biodynamic; Meinklang’s spectacular winery-slash-tasting room does all of them one higher. The constructing is designed in keeping with anthroposophist ideas — extra Steiner woo-woo — and makes use of eco-friendly constructing supplies comparable to an all-wood roof construction and rammed-earth flooring and partitions. Farmer Werner Michlits and collaborating winemaker Niklas Peltzer led me by way of a leisurely tasting and defined their aim: to supply approachable “bridge wines” that should be reasonably priced, trustworthy, and straightforward to get pleasure from.

Just like the Meinklang guests’ heart, Burgenland as an entire is properly kitted out for guests. I loved a hipster hangout, Neusiedler, the place the tattooed technology gathers for grass-fed burgers and natty Blaufränkisch, in addition to Michelin-starred stops for the types of high-end vacationers who return to Vienna with their trunks filled with wine. 

The area’s star institution is Taubenkobel, a Relais & Châteaux resort that opened 41 years in the past as a easy B&B. Today, the founders’ daughter, co-owner Barbara Eselböck, and her husband, chef Alain Weissgerber, ship out 12 programs for lunch. (The very best was a one-bite lovage tart; second finest was a scoop of rhubarb ice cream cupped by radicchio leaves like pink-speckled clamshells.)

The gaggle of wines accompanying the meal included a number of from Intestine Oggau, a vineyard launched in 2007 by the Taubenkobel founders’ different daughter, Stephanie, and her husband, Eduard Tscheppe, who was previously a traditional winemaker in Styria. Lunch proved past a doubt how Austrian pure wines can pair with even probably the most refined delicacies. To not say they had been totally typical — some had been nonetheless slightly unbuttoned by the strictest requirements of propriety. An archconservative on an Austrian wine board’s tasting panel may properly have discovered fault.

However a T-shirt I noticed at Karakterre earlier within the day captured the rising confidence and mischievous spirit of the group gathered there, who care much less yearly what typical arbiters assume — as a result of they’re too busy promoting wine. It was the equal of a one-finger salute geared toward critic Robert Parker, who as soon as dominated supreme because the wine trade’s world arbiter because of his 100-point score system and choice for opulent, conventionally “good” wines. It learn: parker gave me 50. 

The place to Keep and Sip Pure Wine in Austria

Vienna

Lodge Sacher Wien: The grande dame of Vienna resorts, subtly refreshed in 2018, stays a paragon of classical magnificence. Breakfast is served within the excellent ballroom.

Meinklang Hofladen: The in-town “farm store” from Austria’s largest pure vineyard multitasks as a espresso home, all-day café, bakery, wine bar, and wine store, provided by the Michlits household’s Burgenland property.

Styria

Broadmoar: This restaurant-guesthouse gives hyperlocal gastronomy and easy lodging on a picturesque horse farm outdoors Graz.

Weingut Tauss: Naked-bones however endearing, this biodynamic vineyard and inn is surrounded by gardens, wildflowers, and vine-covered hillsides.

Gasthaus Restaurant Thaller: Modern tremendous eating on the church sq. of Veit am Vogau, with a deep wine checklist of bottles from native legends Maria and Sepp Muster.

Gasthaus Stainzerbauer: A comfortable tavern within the historic heart of Graz that highlights conventional Styrian components.

Lilli & Jojo: Calling itself a Wirtshaus, or wine tavern, this cease alongside the wine route charms with elevated nation cooking and a pleasant welcome.

Ploder Rosenberg: Run by two generations who’re captivated with biodynamic wine-making however are delightfully relaxed amongst their vines. Tastings and guided visits can be found. 

Weingut Tement: This huge, family-owned biodynamic vineyard straddles the Austria-Slovenia border and gives tastings — and vistas — on the terrace. 

Burgenland

Intestine Purbach: Positive eating within the village of Purbach with a hearty nose-to-tail menu for adventurous eaters and trendy visitor rooms in an historical stone home.

Neusiedler: An off-the-cuff natural-wine bar that includes bottles from Meingklang, Judith Beck, and Lichtenberger González, plus grass-fed burgers and snacks.

Taubenkobel: The area’s main resort gives luxurious lodging, plus a seasonal tasting menu in the primary eating room ($160) and easier bistro fare at Greisslerei (entrées $15–$47). In each, wines from Intestine Oggau characteristic prominently.

A model of this story first appeared within the August 2024 difficulty of Journey + Leisure below the headline “Pure Choice.”