Martin Müllen

Martin Müllen is another winemaker living in Traben-Trarbach. He is a good frined of Daniel Vollenweider and rents space in Daniels gigantic production-cellars. Martin Müllen has always been regarded as a good producer of a rather old-fashioned and slightly rustic style. A tasting here proved this, but one should not overlook this producer as Martin Müllen follows a well-thought philosophy. First a few words about the winemaking. Like Vollenweider it is hard work in the vineyard. But while Daniel Vollenweider follows a more modern cellar-practice at Müllen it is old wooden barrels, no temperature control and natural yeast-fermentation. As little impact as possible is made in the cellar.

Martin Müllen comes from a family of long wine-making traditions in the Mosel. And since very few of his generation follow in his paths he has had a lot of vine too choose from. And although he only owns 2,6 Ha. of vines he has parcels in at least 6 different einzellagen and makes every year more than 20 different bottlings, which must make the handling of the grapes and the bottling a huge (and expensive) operation.

At Martin Müllen we tasted around 20 wines. Here are the notes:

Kröver Letterlay

This is an einzellage that gives milder acidic wines. The einzellage is placed west of the Steffensberg with south – slightly south-east-facing slopes. The grapes here are always harvested quite early as the grapes ripen fast and acidity always start to fade quite fast too.

Kröver Lettarlay riesling Kabinett trocken 2002

Spicy and slatey nose with some honey. Müllen said there is a touch botrytis to be found in both his spätlesen and kabinetts. Medium bodied in the mouth. Slightly rustic. Good acid and balance. Nice and good kab trocken.

Kröver Lettarlay riesling Spätlese trocken 2002

Slightly more honeyed and floral nose. Medium bodied and milder in the mouth. Less structured. I think I preferred the kabinett.

Kröver Lettarlay riesling Spätlese halbtrocken 2002

My favourite from the Letterlay with a floral and elegant nose and more structure in the mouth than the other Letterlays. Good length.

Kröver Letterlay Riesling Spätlese 1998

Yellow colour. Lightly complex and evolved nose of petrol and floral notes. Good body. Still on the mild side of riesling when it comes to acid. Floral fruit. Not very fullbodied and a bit short on length.

Kröver Steffensberg

The Steffensberg is a vineyard that is placed between the Letterlay and the Wolfer Goldgrube. The lower part of this vineyard is regarded as the "best" vineyard in Kröv. The problem with the Steffensberg is that much of it was replanted with high-yielding clones of riesling (and lower quality) after the 1971 wine law. Much of these are still in the vineyard. To do a replanting back to better clones will take a lot of time, so winemakers hesitate to do that.

Kröver Steffensberg riesling kabinett trocken 2002
The only Steffensberg we tasted showed more earthy and lemony on the nose than the Letterlay. Much more structure and acid. But perhaps not the most concentrated and in the need of more time.

Kröver Paradies
On paper the Paradies is a lesser vineyard than both the Letterlay and the Steffensberg. But Martin Müllen likes his vines here and says that this very large einzellage covers both very good and not at all good plots. These were generally also my favourites among the Kröv-einzellagen with more elegance than the others.

Kröver Paradies Riesling Spätlese trocken 2002
More elegant and floral nose. Also acidic and structured in the mouth. Full-bodied and still a bit closed with a lemony finish. The most elegant of the Kröver-wines and my favourite among these. Build to last.

Kröver Paradies Riesling auslese trocken 1994
Yellow colour. Intence, rich and complex nose. Petrolly with lots of floral notes. Powerful in the mouth. Good concentration, still young and with lots of acidity. A bit rustic but nicely developed wine. Very interesting.

Kröver Paradies Riesling kabinett feinherb 2002
Sweeter floral nose. Good body and a quite sweet feinherb, but with good acidity. But aromatically not as interesting as the trocken-versions.

Kröver Paradies Riesling kabinett 2002
More fruity and sweet nose. Still floral and not without elegance. More closed in the mouth. Powerful and with good acidity. A bit simple - will it develop?

Riesling Wurzelecht 2000
This is a wine which Martin Müllen made in 2000 from old vines with original rootstocks. Vines were from both Paradies and Letterlay. Martin Müllen said that this wine was not at all impressive as young and he was underwhelmed. But with time in bottle this has developed more and more positively. Today this showed a highly petrolly nose with a lot of floral high notes and spices. Intence and this screams out riesling. Medium bodied, a bit sweet (feinherb) with some development. Great acidity and length. Very good.

Kinheimer Rosenberg riesling kabinett 2002
This is a vineyard who Martin Müllen says gives highly sought after wines in the Mosel by those who don't like the high acids in riesling. The wine from here is very mild and highly fruity. So is the style of this wine. It
has a tropical nose with some spices. Powerful and almost fat in the mouth with less acid than the other wines. Sweet and easy forgettable style.

Trarbacher Hühnerberg
This is an unknown einzellage from where Martin Müllen makes his best wines. The einzellage is 8 Ha. quite close to the Hünsrück. But most of it is abandoned today. The best part (according to Martin Müllen) consists of a 3 Ha sweep facing (just like the end of a fotball-tribune was Müllens words) from south-east to south to south-west. This part of the Hühnerberg was once regarded as one of the very best einzellagen in the whole of Mosel (according to the old map and classification of vineyards from 1897 that more and more winegrowers in the Mosel now use) , but has lost most of it's glory due to the fact that the growers that owns this einzellage has not been interesting in making quality-wine.
It is easy to see that Martin Müllen has a great love for this einzellage which he bought in 2000. He makes one dry and one lieblich version of the Hühnerberg and makes selections of very sweet wines. From the parts that are facing south-east (the western part of the vineyard) he selects grapes to his trocken (and eiswein?), from parts facing south and south-west he selects grapes for the lieblich version and for sweeter-styled wines. For the trocken and the lieblich Martin Müllen has abandoned the use of prädikats. This does not mean that he puts sugar in the wines, but he feels that all the grapes from the Hühnerberg gives much taste, minerals and concentration even at lower Oechsle-weights. So he says it does not make any sense to follow these rules. Martin Müllen loves these wines for their combination of power and "leichtigkeit" - the beautiful german word that can be translated to lightness.
The wines are very mineral indeed. To me they taste like no other wines I have had from the Mosel. They taste more like rieslings from Wachau with intence stoney minerals and an apricoty element. All the wines from
this einzellage had these similarities in the aromas. I later also tasted a Hühnerberg from another producer which showed the same character (although the quality of that wine were far behind Müllens).

Two days before the tasting at Martin Müllen he also said that he had a great loss of grapes from the Trarbacher Hühnerberg this year. The grapes looked very great so far in the 2003, but the wild pigs in the Hünsrück, which are overpopulated had eaten most of his good grapes (and of course the best grapes only) . He expected a loss of about 2000 bottles of wines, but hoped to make at least one bottling from the Hühnerberg this year. It’s tough to be a winemaker as this will give him a 20000 € loss of income this year.

Trarbacher Hühnerberg Riesling Qualitätswein Trocken 2002
Highly mineral and elegant nose. Some apricot and spices. Powerful and mineral in the mouth. This is interesting. Acidic and structured wine with power and transparency. The best wine of the day for me. A tremendous QPR. Great wine with interesting future.

Trarbacher Hühnerberg Riesling Qualitätswein 2002
More apricot on the nose. Sweet with mineral and some spices. But more closed and not showing so much minerals. Powerful and quite sweet with a light spritz in the mouth. Good concentration, but again lacking a bit of that mineral touch I find in the trocken. Perhaps a bit closed. Long, fine acidic finish. Very interesting wine.

Trarbacher Hühnerberg Riesling Auslese 2002

Colour shows more extract than the other 2002. Sweet honeyed and slightly tropical nose with some spices and apricot. Powerful and sweet entrance in the mouth. Slight fatness. A fullbodied auslese of much Oechsle. Very fruity styled and not very much botrytis Müllen confirms. Slight honeyed touch. Tremendous length and acidic structure. Very good, but also more expensive.

The three Hühnerbergs I tasted from Müllen are all highly recommended and this is probably an einzellage that deserves better recognition. Also wines from the Kröver Paradies and the Steffensberg should be tested. Martin Müllen is a good winemaker and should not be overlooked. Generally to me the dry wines here where more interesting than the sweeter ones.