Alsace: Fortune or misfortune?

Participating in WSET Level 3 Educator Program gave me a new chance to have another closer look into Alsace: An underrated complicated Wine region.

If we say Vosges Mountains is a natural gift, giving Alsace dry air and sunshine, to make fuller-bodied wine than what is supposed to be at this latitude. Its complicated history, full of flesh and blood, the identity confusion, the language and culture mix, … is definitely a challenge.

Famous sculpture in Strasbourg. Mother holds two dead sons, one fought for Germany, another fought for France. "Les Malgrés Nous".

How many times, the vine flourished in the history since it was cultivated at least the 4th century, and how many times it was seriously destroyed?

Even its appellation system has been - can I say - ignored and delayed, especially Grand Cru system. Alsace had to fight to get AOC status in place, as late as 1962, as a mono appellation.

Grand Cru system (in force from 1983 starting with only 25, now there are 51), once founded and led by Jean HUGEL, who developed as well as the guidelines of Vendange Tardive and Sélection de Grain Noble in 1984, is not even used in HUGEL & Fils wine itself even when the wine is made from Grand Cru vineyards.

And he is not alone. Some other top producers do the same. We respect the results of enormous research by Hugel and other geologists for around 30 years, there is no doubt that boundary of Grand Cru is too loose, some is too large, and others are not producing equal quality as their peers.

Shall we say: “Better poorly defined Grand Cru than no Grand Crus at all. ” No doubt, we do respect the perfection and professionalism, but this protestation definitely doesn’t help on Grand Cru system of the region, which has already lots of challenges to promote itself.

Geological complexity is another natural gift, which merits, at least an exhaustive research and analysis, as same as Burgundy, if not more.

Alsace shares similar passion as Burgundy from many aspects: mono grape variety (it stands so strongly in its position, AOC label shows grape variety) , grand respect on terroir, organic and biodynamic viticulture, classification based on vineyard. Therefore, naturally, the ongoing establishment of Premier Cru classification follows the vineyard passion “lieux-dits”, in the manner of Burgundy.

It is one of the wine regions who privilege pure expression of grape variety by respecting each plot of land. Although there is some rejection voice saying it didn’t choose ideal grape varieties for each terroir, does the other famous region do?

Burgundy, with its endless efforts on minute geological nuance, has gained worldwide high reputation, high recognition followed by high price. Someone questions if we can replace some Pinot Noir planting by Chardonnay, or vice versa, to suit more minute terroir. The question is: Can we afford to make this experiment?

Article by: Jin ROGER, DipWSET