2007 Baron di Pauli 'Exilissi' Gewürztraminer, Alto Adige DOC

Six bottles available. A nineteen-year-old Gewürztraminer, which is not a thing you see often.

Almost all Gewürztraminer is drunk within three years of the harvest. Exilissi is built differently, and the reason is in the vineyard.

The site

The fruit comes from Höfl unterm Stein, a single site at Söll above Termeno, at roughly 480 to 550 metres on sandy limestone, facing south-east. Termeno is Tramin in German, and it is the village that gave Traminer its name. This is the grape's home address.

The grapes are picked late, well into overripeness, then given extended contact with their skins before going into barrel. That combination, overripe fruit plus skin contact plus wood, produces a Gewürztraminer with real weight and structure rather than the usual perfume-and-gone. It is why a 2007 can still be standing.

What to expect

Rich, powerful and broad, in the dry-to-off-dry register rather than a dessert wine, with the sweet impression that comes from ripeness rather than sugar. Falstaff's notes on nearby vintages of this wine give candied pineapple, rose petal and baked apple, with enormous fullness and a long clove-inflected finish. At nineteen years expect the rose and lychee to have given way to honey, dried apricot, ginger and orange peel, with the wine turning deep gold.

We have not been able to verify a published critic score for the 2007 at source, so we are not printing one. Falstaff has scored neighbouring vintages of this wine in the low nineties; those numbers belong to those years.

The estate

Baron di Pauli was founded in the eighteenth century by the Di Pauli family, Tyrolean nobility. Anton Baron Di Pauli was an Austrian trade minister, and the estate held K&K Hoflieferant status, purveyor to the imperial and royal courts, shipping wine to Vienna and St Petersburg. The family joined Cantina Kaltern as members in 1998 and relaunched the estate wines the following year. Andrea Moser makes the wine; Baron Carl Philipp von Hohenbühel runs the estate.

The details

• Producer: Baron di Pauli, Caldaro/Kaltern
• Appellation: Alto Adige DOC / Südtirol DOC
• Vineyard: Höfl unterm Stein, Söll above Termeno
• Vintage: 2007
• Grape: 100% Gewürztraminer, late-picked
• Vinification: extended skin contact, then barrel ageing
• Drinking window: now. This is a mature bottle, not one to keep.

Serving and pairing

Serve at 50 to 54°F, not fridge-cold, in a white wine glass with some bowl to it. Aged Alpine cheeses, foie gras, roast pork with apple, or spiced Asian dishes. A wine this rich handles heat and sweetness better than almost any other white.

Six in stock, packed for transit and shipped from Florida. Browse more whites.