Red Newt Cellars The Knoll Riesling 2015
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Suckling
James -
Enthusiast
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Parker
Robert
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Winemaker Notes
This Riesling is voluptuous and racy with bright citrus aromas in the nose, a perfectly balanced palate with a luscious sweetness and edgy acidity, and a lingering finish. The Knoll Riesling captures the quintessential personality of Finger Lakes Riesling.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
This has so much dried and bitter citrus character with spicy white pepper and hints of ginseng. Medium-bodied, compact and layered. Vibrant and spicy. Esoteric and enjoyable.
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Wine Enthusiast
Sourced from a vineyard on the west side of Seneca Lake, this semidry wine offers sunny aromas of canned peach, yellow blossoms and saffron on the nose. The medium-bodied palate is luscious and creamy in feel, with a grip of dried apricot rind and focused acidity providing a fine counterbalance. It offers excellent concentration, depth and balance.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2015 Riesling The Knoll - Lahoma Vineyards is from Seneca Lake, with four grams of residual sugar, 7.5 of total acidity and 13.2% alcohol. When last seen, this looked pretty fine, this being only the third vintage of this bottling. Lively and bright, this has a touch of the grapefruit that I saw on the Tango Oaks, but here it is a more minor nuance (or, nuisance, depending on your view). Expressive, a little delicate, but surprisingly persistent, this young Riesling is on track to develop and age well. It has the structure and the concentration.
Other Vintages
2018-
Suckling
James -
Spirits
Wine & -
Parker
Robert
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James -
Enthusiast
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Robert -
Spirits
Wine &
David and Debra Whiting met in the late 1980s when David was working as cellar master at a Finger Lakes winery and Debra was supervising microbiology labs at Cornell University. David’s oenological career blossomed as he worked at three different vineyards in Finger Lakes and Debra’s passion for food led her to start a gourmet cheesecake business and then an upscale catering company. The couple founded Red Newt Cellars in 1998 and Debra opened the Red Newt Bistro alongside the first wine releases in June of 1999. In 2011 Debra’s life was sadly cut short, prompting David to delegate some of his duties and hire a winemaker. In 2014 Kelby Russell, a Finger Lakes native, joined the team as the head winemaker.
Today, the Red Newt Cellars winery and Bistro are located in the small town of Hector in the Finger Lakes region of New York, on the southeastern corner of Seneca Lake. At 600 meters below sea level, Seneca Lake is the deepest of the Finger Lakes and one of the deepest lakes in the United States. The effects of the lake and the resulting range of surrounding altitudes and soil types create a wide array of unique terroirs in a relatively small area.
All of the vineyards Red Newt work with for their vinifera program are located on and around the Lake. To the Northwest, Nut Road is comprised of limestone and sandstone and produces an aromatic, delicate Loire Valley-style Cabernet Franc used for Kelby’s rosé. To the west sits Lahoma Vineyard, Red Newt’s largest vineyard. This land is all sandstone and is one of the highest vineyards in the area. The Knoll, a parcel within Lahoma Vineyard that is used to grow the benchmark Riesling for Red Newt, is the highest point at 1,600 ft. Nearby, lower-lying vines provide grapes for some of the other wines including the Circle Riesling and the Dry Riesling. Near the bottom of the lake is Tango Oaks, a compelling site that is a flood plain offering a mix of silt and loam on top of the bedrock. This site features Riesling planted to Alsatian clones, as opposed to the more typical German style Geisenheim ones, which brings an interesting tropical fruit finish to wines from this spot. The east bank of the lake is called the “Banana Belt,” a reference to its warm climate that farmers used to joke was well situated for banana growing. This microclimate is where you’ll find Red Newt’s red varieties, Cabernet Franc and Merlot.