Luxembourg tasting notes

text and photographs © 2008 Tom Cannavan

These notes accompany our in-depth feature on Luxembourg.

Caves Sunnen-Hoffmann

Sunnen-Hoffmann Pinot Gris Wintrange Hommelsbierg Selection 135th Anniversaire 2006
Yield of 45hl/ha Fine, expressive Pinot Gris nose with smoke, stone fruit aromas and a suggestion of weight and fat. Indeed palate is off-dry, with lovely richness and weight, and a solid mid palate flooded with melon and musky fruit. Fine acidity and lovely balance. 89/100

Sunnen-Hoffmann Pinot Gris Domaine et Tradition 2006
Yield of lass than 25hl/ha Harvested three weeks later. Similar but slightly less powerful nose to the 135th Anniversaire cuvee. Palate is a touch sweeter perhaps, but with still good weight but a drier, pithier character. Perhaps a little more structure. 89/100

Sunnen-Hoffmann Riesling Wintrange Hommelsbierg Selection 135th Anniversaire 2006
Very soft and fruity, with forward, open fruit. Palate is much drier than the nose suggests, with plenty of lemon and lime zest and raciness. Delicious. 88/100

Sunnen-Hoffmann Riesling 2006
Nice note of minerality - stony - and ripe, fresh apple and very pure pear. Big, pithy, clean lemon fruit with bracing acidity and a real sense of structure. Quite dry, but beautifully polished with good fruit and balance. 88/100

Domaine Sunnen-Hoffman Riesling 2003
Little notes of beeswax and a touch of petrol, with very elegant minerality: quite Mosel-like, with delicate apple and apple blossom notes. The palate has a huge, dry core of minerality and citrus, with a certain succulence. Reminiscent of some tropical fruit, but the massive, pithy, decisive acidity powers through. This retains a sense of delicacy and balance though, it just has lovely presence and knife-edge balance. 90/100

Caves Sunnen-Hoffmann
6 rue des Près
L-5441 Remerschen

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