Inherited Bottles

If properly stored, these could still be quite good but are definitely wines to drink soon.

If you open one, chill it in the fridge for about 30 minutes first, then decant and start drinking right away. You never know if this will improve with 1-2 hours of air or fall apart in minutes, but the latter is the more likely scenario.

In any event, there is a good chance these will still have some quality to them and I hope you will please post a note when you drink one. I have had a great many older German vintages, but never a 67!

Take care,

Tom.

Drink it _now_, with your wife and kids. Serve them a little, perhaps watered a bit. Talk about your memories of your grandfather if they were pleasant. Invent something nice if they weren't. Don't waste this legacy. It's a _beverage_; not a monument.

Tom S

Caution, Tom. If it does not say riesling on the label, it most certainly won't be. Chances are high that it's made from müller-thurgau or one of the numerous new breeding. Rheinhessen was the region where these crossings (described by a German food critic as "having the taste of the smell of a train station barber store") spread widely, and Dienheim is reputed to make soft, early maturing wines.

So the odds don't seem too good, alas.

M.

Caution, Tom. If it does not say riesling on the label, it most certainly won't be. Chances are high that it's made from müller-thurgau or one of the numerous new breedings. Rheinhessen was the region where these crossings (described by a German food critic as "tasting like the smell of a train station barber store") spread widely, and Dienheim is reputed to make soft, early maturing wines.

So the odds don't seem too good, alas.

M.