German AP Nos.

I had seen a German TN on another board where the AP Number was listed as part of the specs in the original post. I roughly understand this number to be a verification of sorts that the wine has properly been through the classification system, by why is it beneficial to include it in one's notes?

Jason

Reply to
Jaybert41
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Normally not very interesting - the number lists area, commune, producer and batch/bottling for a given year. Theoretically there might be two identically named wines with different numbers but you don't see that very often. I recall, however, once commenting to a grower that his Auslese should have had a bit more acid for balance, whereupon he produced another bottle of the same wine with exactly that property! Anders

Reply to
Anders Tørneskog

Aaah... now this makes a lot of sense to me; albeit requiring some reference work to figure out what the numbers correspond to. So basically it is a tool used to identify even more specific information about wines that may have been bottled from different barrels, tanks, etc.

That probably saves a lot of misleading bottling information that could create difficulties for beginners such as myself thinking that they may have the "best" wine.

Okay, so that gives a little more explanation at to some wines that are referred to as Gold Cap or One Star.

Thanks to everyone for their input.

Jason

Reply to
Jaybert41

I beg to disagree. "Best" or "finest" is illegal, but you'll usually find something to distinguish various batches of a wine from a given producer. Many will designate their best Ausleses with an attribute, two or three or even 4 stars, others give a barrel number, others again mark them with a golden capsule, which again may have two different lengths (normal or long). These will all have different numbers, of course. But, seeing two

*identically* labeled bottles with different numbers is pretty rare, imho. Anders
Reply to
Anders Tørneskog

Some valuable info here from John "Swetstuff" Trombley, a passionate advocateof German Riesling:

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Dale

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Reply to
Dale Williams

Hi, reading the info I see: "Although this system serves to uniquely identify each bottling, it has been criticized, and I believe rightly, for having standards that are much too low."

Whatever the standard is, the number does indeed identify the batch and it is extremely rare to see a presumed quality bottle without it. The point still is, you don't *normally* see two *equally* labeled bottles with different numbers. So, the number, imho, isn't very important in a tasting note.. Anders

Reply to
Anders Tørneskog
Reply to
Michael Pronay

' Maybe Merkelbach? I seem to remember he has mutliple UrzWurz Spatlesen and Aulese (each Fuder gets a different AP)/. .

Thanks for following up Michael!

Dale

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Reply to
Dale Williams

Interesting piece that! I'll have to check on the story visiting Brauneberg and Brauneberger Hof in about 6 weeks time :-) Otherwise, browsing through weinguide.de it appears that Merkelbach indeed does do something like that - several different Ausleses from the same vineyard without other markings than the batch number. Anders

Reply to
Anders Tørneskog

This is not an unusual practice. In fact it is quite common. I know many vineyard owners, particularly, in the Mosel who do that. For some unknown reason on barrel with wine from the same vineyard will be just better than another. The winemaker will then submit that lot to the AP board as a separate wine. Most people do not notice the difference in AP numbers. On occasion when the wine is reviewed it will not "look for this or that AP number" I will be in Germany in October and get some specific information about this and will pass it on

Reply to
sibeer

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