Sauvignon Blanc Kitzeck-Sausal – from Wohlmuth in Southern Styria

The Wohlmuth Sauvignon Blanc Kitzeck-Sausal 2022 is a wonderfully dry white wine from Styria in Austria. The Sauvignon Blanc from Weingut Wohlmuth is a spicy, smoky, complex wine with multi-layered aromas and a strong terroir imprint. On the palate, its spectrum of aromas reveals ripe yellow tropical fruits such as passion fruit and physalis, as well as candied orange zest, with a touch of the vegetal, sweet red pepper, and always with a fine slate spice, a wonderfully cool minerality, finesse, and precision. Here, the ingenious interplay of grape variety, soil, unique location, and living winemaking tradition, which at Wohlmuth has a 200-year history, is evident.

Wohlmuth – Wine Production

The Sauvignon Blanc vines grow in absolutely steep vineyard slopes on phyllitic slate soils, reddish and black in color. This slate is thinly layered, sometimes a little more compact with inclusions of quartz, sericite, and potassium feldspar. Under the influence of the Illyrian climate, which brings warm winds from the Mediterranean and cool winds from the northern Alps to Kitzeck in Southern Styria, and with a great deal of manual labor on the steep slopes, which requires an admirable connection to home, this dry white wine with its unmistakable, complex fruit expression is created.

All grapes are selectively hand-picked very late. Since the vineyards are located around the winery, there are no long transport routes. After 8-16 hours of maceration, pressing is gentle and slow. Spontaneous fermentation takes place in large, used wooden barrels, as does the 7-month maturation on fine lees.

Even though the Sauvignon Blanc grape variety does not yet have such a long tradition in Styria, it has found a place there where it finds optimal conditions and produces wines of international stature. The grape variety originated from a cross between Traminer and Chenin Blanc and originally comes from the Loire. It has small, densely packed berries. Its vigorous growth requires good canopy management, as its aromatic compounds, methoxypyrazines and mercaptans, are light-sensitive. Its characteristic bouquet ranges from grassy, green-fruited, and bell pepper notes in not fully ripe grapes to an expressive aromatic diversity of elderflower, gooseberries, cassis, and tropical fruits such as passion fruit in ripe harvested grapes. In Styria, great premium wines with great development potential are produced, which are among the best worldwide.

The Sauvignon Blanc Kitzeck-Sausal is a classic village wine exclusively from grapes around Kitzeck in Southern Styria. The Kitzeck-Sausal appellation within Southern Styria is a geological peculiarity, as the soils are much older than in the rest of Southern Styria and were formed over 400 million years ago with the Central Alps. The landscape is therefore rougher, which around Kitzeck is reflected not only in impressively steep vineyards with direct access but also in numerous terraced systems. The difference from the highest point of the hills to the valley floor is usually over 200 meters and is also evident in the particular steepness of the vineyards. The vineyards are mostly located at altitudes of 380 to 650 meters, which contributes to good ventilation of the vines.

The 2022 vintage is accompanied by a painting by Laura Stadtegger, who sees the characteristic of her paintings in the movement between the real and imaginary world. Fascinated by myths and archetypes, she sees her art as messages that concern people worldwide. The artist, originally from Graz, born in 1984, completed her studies in applied art at the University of Vienna, with a year abroad at the School of Visual Arts in New York. She then lived in Amsterdam for a while before moving her studio to Munich in 2011. Her works can be admired in exhibitions such as in London in 2023.

Sauvignon Blanc Kitzeck-Sausal – a wine and its characteristics

• Origin Austria
• Growing region Southern Styria
• Village wine Kitzeck-Sausal
• Grape variety Sauvignon Blanc
• vegan
• sustainably certified
• 12.5 % vol. alcohol
• 6.8 g/l acidity
• 2.8 g/l residual sugar