Reissante 1990

The guests on Piazza San Marco loved the taste of frizzante, so guests in the Reiss Bar in Marco d’Avianogasse were bound to love it too. After all, Austria had white wines far more suitable for producing frizzante. No sooner said than done! In the spring of 1990 the first Austrian frizzante came into being. Dubbed “Reissante” it was presented to guests at the Reiss Bar in crystal clear bottles with cool green labels.

Reissante is produced exclusively from Welschriesling and contains at least 30% wine from new vineyards. It has 11% alcohol by volume and is of a delicate pale green color. Silky and elegant, it has the fruity acidity typical of Weinviertel wines and nishes on a slight citrusy note.

Reissante had less than half the carbonation of sekt (local sparkling wine) or champagne. It lled not only glasses but apparently, a market niche. The idea of Reissante was picked up by Kattus, a major producer of sparkling wine in Vienna. Kattus Frizzante enjoyed one of the biggest successes a new sparkling wine product had ever had in the history of Austrian sparkling wine producers. Hundreds of thousands of bottles were consumed in those first years.

THANK YOU, Herbert Pratsch.

He made sure my ideas became optimum reality. He was the ultimate arbiter.

THANK YOU, Ernst Polsterer-Kattus.

He made available the Kattus cellar and lling equipment as well as the Kattus laboratory. Most importantly, he let me make the fullest “use” of his winemaker, Herbert Pratsch.

POYS Brut 1991

The POYS brut – Blanc et Blanc de Rouge was a world premiere.

It was the first sekt cuvée from the traditional Austrian grapes Welschriesling (blanc) and Zweigelt (blanc de rouge). This unique cuvee combines the lean light elegance of Welschriesling with the slightly fruity full-bodiness of Zweigelt.

Blanc de rouge – red becomes white.

Zweigelt being pressed white means only the seihmost is fermented, i.e. only the juice that runs out freely from the pressure of the grapes alone, not the force of the press. Thanks to this, the most noble press process, the wine remains golden in color while retaining its fine varietal character.

The wine is what makes POYS brut.

Sparkling wine of the finest quality can only be made from quality wine. For POYS brut, exclusively bone-dry quality wines from around Poysdorf were processed for the first time into a sparkling wine in Austria.

POYS brut was traditionally fermented in the bottle.

It is the years of resting in the bottle on the yeast that creates the dense, fine sparkling character of POYS brut.

POYS brut from Poysdorf.

For over a century, Poysdorf has been the source of the best wines for producing sparkling wine. They are the driest and sometimes even steely with a pronounced acidity and above all they are pleasant to drink.

As an homage to this venerable wine-making tradition I named this extraordinary sparkling wine POYS brut.

A safe protects the POYS brut.

I created a special, instantly recognizable bottle for the inimitable POYS brut. It is made from dark glass that surrounds this fine sparkling wine like a safe, protecting it from light so that it maintains its fine quality for years.

THANK YOU above all to Edith and Wolfgang Pratsch, who painstakingly picked their best Zweigelt grapes for me at the perfect point in time. The unusual pressing method and perfect fermentation of the “white Zweigelt” are what made this wonderful base wine for processing into sparkling wine.

THANK YOU to Herbert Pratsch. Your astounding knowledge, your enthusiasm for making what is probably Austria’s best sparkling wine make POYS brut what it has become; a sparkling wine able to win or place high in national and international tasting competitions.

THANK YOU to Ernst Polsterer-Kattus. He made the Kattus cellar and lling equipment available to me again, as well as the Kattus laboratory. Most importantly, he again allowed me to make the fullest “use” of his winemaker, Herbert Pratsch.

POYS VERDE VELTLINER 1994

THE FIRST GRÜNER VELTLINER WITH A HINT OF MOUSSEUX

Grüner Veltliner is a wine known for its youthful freshness, peppery spirit and drinkability. That was my initial thought.

On my wine travels, I happened upon the Portuguese wine Vino Verde. It too is a light, drinkable wine but falls far short of Grüner Veltliner in terms of quality.

It was the fermentation process that attracted my attention. A cool fermentation method (15°-16°C) enables the Portuguese to retain the natural carbonation in the wine (up to 1 bar).

I picked up this idea. My hope was to use the fine mousseux to reinforce the youthfulness of the Grüner Veltliner to an even greater extent while defining 11% alcohol by volume as the maximum alcohol level thus enhancing the lightness and the drinkability of this wine. The overriding goal throughout was to produce a quality wine.

The first attempt was made in 1993. It failed.

In 1994 the time had come. We were able to present POYS VERDE VELTLINER.

Filled in the unmistakable one-liter bottle with the double seal. Cork and screw cap. The cork was to signal quality wine; the screw cap to give consumers an easy and reliable way of keeping the fine mousseux in the wine after they had opened the bottle.

THANK YOU. Never change a winning team.

Herbert Pratsch. Master winemaker.
Once again, he made sure my ideas became optimum reality. He was and remains the ultimate arbiter.

Edith and Wolfgang Pratsch.
Owners of a vineyard estate in Martinsdorf. They showed me their full a ection, giving me the best vineyards for my wines and developing a new technique, a cool fermentation process.