Wine: Besigheimer Felsengarten Cabernet Dorsa

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Tomorrow I intend to visit the yearly wine festival in Besigheim. I say "yearly", but it's actually the first festival since the Corona pandemic, so it's going to be a special occasion. The people of Besigheim are proud of their wine. Germany makes the best wines in the world. That might come as a surprise to wine lovers in England, because Germany hardly exports any wine. In fact, when it comes to wine Germans look down on England. They say that the English don't understand wine, so Germans drink the best wine themselves and export the rubbish to England.

There are 13 wine growing areas in Germany. The opinions on the relative quality are biased. There are distinct differences in taste, and people in each area say their own wine is the best. Call me biased, but I'm convinced that Württemberg wines are the best. That's what my work colleagues told me when I first moved to Stuttgart, and over time I began to agree with them. One thing I was told is that when you're invited to someone's home you should give them a bottle of wine, but only Württemberg wine. If you give him a bottle of French wine he'll be insulted.

The people of Besigheim say their wine is the best wine in Württemberg, i.e. the best wine in the world. I enjoy the Besigheimer wines, and I've drunk a lot of them, but I have to disagree. I prefer the wine from the Heilbronn area.

Today I've been drinking a Besigheimer wine, the Cabernet Dorsa. It's a new wine to me. It was created in Württemberg in 1971 as a cross of the grapes Lemberger and Dornfelder, but it wasn't recognised as a new variety until 2004. Since then it's been rapidly growing in popularity, planted in vineyards across Germany. Surprisingly, the majority of Cabernet Dorsa grapes are grown in the Pfalz (Palatinate), 78 hectares (193 acres), compared with only 29 hectares (72 acres) in Württemberg. It would be interesting to compare them.

This is a map of the wine-growing areas in Germany. The largest areas are:

    Rheinhessen (26,685 hectares)

    Pfalz (22,885 hectares)

    Baden (15,429 hectares)

    Württemberg (11,140 hectares)

    Mosel (8,594 hectares)

I'll let you convert the hectares into acres yourself. Multiply by 2.5.

I mentioned above that the Cabernet Dorsa is a cross between Lemberger and Dornfelder grapes. I greatly enjoy Lemberger wines for their fruity flavour, but I find Dornfelder wines harsh and unpalatable. However, the mixture of the two grapes has produced an astoundingly powerful taste. If I were a wine expert I would be able to describe it better. All I can say is that it's very fruity, even more so than Lemberger. It lacks the subtlety of Lemberger, so I suspect that Carnet Dorsa is a wine to drink in larger quantities. I haven't tried it yet. I don't like to get drunk, but I could at least drink a few glasses to get an impression.