Alsace Revisited

Pork chops with ginger plum sauce and a rich, spicy Gewurztraminer—a perfect match for a recent Sunday dinner that made me nostalgic for my European travels of last summer.

Readers may recall my summertime adventures in Alsace—navigating the beautiful French wine region with two teenagers in tow, while hunting for a certain producer (Marc Tempé), whose playful nickname is the “Bear of Alsace.”

When we finally did find Marc, we tasted about fifteen wines, and with hungry teens tapping fingers on the table, my notes that day were unusually cryptic.

But there was one wine that I circled with a detailed note and my husband’s name next to it—the Grand Cru Mambourg Vendanges Tardives Gewurztraminer "S" 2001. It was the only wine I carried home and I did so just to serve it with this particular Asian-inspired dish, a favorite in our home.

Alongside my note I drew an arrow from the letter “S” to a word I jotted down—Steinigerweg, which is German for stony path. It’s a reference to a specific parcel of land within the Mambourg Grand Cru vineyard that was planted in the 1930s.

The wine is the color of light honey, and that honeyed quality is infused into the flavors and aromas but with an interesting note of beeswax that my friend Thad picked up—definitely a result of the botrytis-affected grapes. It has a perfectly balanced sweetness and is loaded with citrusy, spicy acidity and a long mineral finish—perhaps the embodiment of the stony path—as if some of the stones were dipped in grapefruit juice, lightly sprinkled with sugar, then dropped into the bottom of each of our glasses.

Tags: wine