GUT OGGAU
Austria, Burgenland
The Gut Oggau wine estate is located by the Lake Neusiedl in the province of Burgenland in eastern Austria. Oggau is a winegrowing village famous for its quality and with traditions dating back to the Romans. Stephanie and Eduard Tscheppe-Eselböck is running it since 2007. Before getting their own vineyard Eduard used to make conventional wines with his father and Stephanie’s family ran a Michelin starred restaurant called Taubenkobel. The vineyard had been abandoned for 20 years when they took over and that actually allowed for the disappearing of pesticides and chemicals used in the old days. In that way they could start their focus is biodynamic viticulture straight away (Demeter certified). They fully understand the significance of biodynamic cultivation and implement this philosophy systematically in their vineyard. The strenghts of the vines are used to the full and the wines are left in the cellar to attain their utmost potential in peace. The result is a large selection of wines full of character that is typical of the region, authentic and offer the top quality derived from biodynamic viniculture.
Each of the wines has its own personality and is closely related to the other wine characters. Thus, the wines become distinctive people, who form a unique wine family as a whole. The portraits on the labels are made by German artist Jung von Matt and every new vintage you can see that the faces are ageing. The most traditional members of the family are the Mechthild and Bertholdi grandparent wines, which comes from two single vineyards of older vines and are pressed manually in an old beam press. The parental generation consists of a number of powerful, full-bodied wines comprised by Timotheus, Emmeram, Josephine, Joschuari and Wiltrude. While the youngest wines, Theodora, Winifred and Atanasius, constitute the third generation which are more forthright, light, bold and energetic. A very exciting family tree that really awards closer aquaintance.
Gut Oggau work with six main grape varieties; Blaufrankish, Zweigelt, Grüner Veltliner, Welchriesling, Weissburgunder and Gewurtztraminer. The soils are different for each generation, the youngest is grown in gravel and limestone while the parents and grandparents has more sunlight and schist and limestone soil. The old vines and the 200 years old restored winepress is reserved for the grandparents. The fermentation is spontaneous with naturally occuring indigenous yeasts. Ageing is done in old oak barrels and no filtering or fining is done.
