Remember in the 2006 vintage when every wine seemed to give you a 2-class upgrade? When even the “little” wines showed affects of grandeur, and when it was seriously tempting to assume that even nondescript land could give wines to rival the Grand Crus? That fine growers in non-elite regions could offer wines nearly as good as the Great Ones at a fraction of the price?

There is a reality check in your glass, and it’s the 2008 vintage. For this is a year when terroir tells, when land is the most decisive indicator of quality.

But there are many stories encased in this vintage. One is that it will relieve any and all of us who were growing weary of higher alcohols in Austrian wines. ’08 has about 1% less across the board, and even the top wines seldom push much past 13%. Another story is that of the severely difficult conditions under which this vintage was created. It started with a very rainy summer, which led to rampant infestations of downy mildew (which they call “peronospora,” or shorten to just “pero”), which required growers to spray almost constantly, unless, as Erich Berger put it, “You sprayed at just the right moment. I was out in the vineyards on a Saturday and saw the first signs of pero, so I called around and finally snagged enough neighbors and friends to go out on Sunday and spray. The ones who waited till Monday or Tuesday were too late, and they spent the rest of the summer trying to catch up.”

No matter what you think of fungicides, one thing they seem to do is retard ripeness, so that growers who used them ended up having to harvest very late even by Austrian standards. I heard a range of stories to explain this. Some spoke of a rainy first half of October, yet others said their weather was good. Most echoed their German colleagues and spoke of delaying picking until acids went down; the Austrian grower doesn’t relish very high acidity. Some growers even chaptalized; more, I suspect, than were willing to admit it.

Many were the tales of harvesting till the end of November and even longer. But there were two interesting exceptions.

Each of my two bio-dynamic estates picked rather early by 2008’s standards. Hirsch and Nikolaihof were finished well before Halloween, and Nikolaihof even picked a Smaragd before the end of September. None of their wines tasted remotely clipped or underripe; just the opposite. Well, hmmmmm….

The morning after my Nikolaihof visit I sat with another grower and repeated their story. He couldn’t help from rolling his eyes, and I couldn’t help but notice. Now most of you know I am adamantly not dogmatic on the whole organic/bio-d thing. The parameters are too complex, the varieties of conscience too many, and it’s more helpful to encourage the steps taken than to condemn the steps not taken. But I was bemused by this grower’s reaction, and we talked about it. I learned of a certain resentment some growers feel toward what they see as organic piety. Often they themselves read it in – we do resent those we perceive as more moral than we are, after all. But if the organic grower seems at all preachy, it creates a shadow-reaction from the others. “I’d never dictate to any wine grower what his “proper” commitment to ecology ought to be, “ I said, “Nor do I believe there is only a single pathway to heaven. I know many growers who are deeply committed to the health of their land, and who choose systems other than organic,” I continued. “Yet look: I was there, I tasted, the truth is in the glass, and unless the people are lying to me, there’s something to this idea that bio-dynamics can give physiologically riper fruit earlier in the harvest season.”  He nodded. “And in my opinion serious growers should consider this phenomenon, not for ethical or political or environmental reasons, but because it exists and is interesting.”

He was willing to agree. Which was very reasonable of him, really. Nikolaihof’s vineyards are largely near the Danube, where the nights are milder and where there’s plenty of air dispersal at all times. The other guy’s vineyards are wind-sheltered and he has more risk of mildews and fungi. Still, what are we to make of this fact? The two bio-d growers picked earlier, had riper fruit and rounder acids. It doesn’t seem prudent to look the other way.

The white wines of 2008 are almost uniformly compact, dry-dry, minty and stony. There’s a narrow band of quite-good quality, at least here in this portfolio, with almost no “failures” but equally no huge number of standouts. For the Burgenland whites I really liked the snap and posture of the ‘08s; these wines can sprawl in warmer years. In the Weinviertel everything was good. As I went west the highlights began to appear. The great sites of the Kamptal, Kremstal and Wachau gave wines about as good as 2007, sometimes a little lighter, sometimes even better, all with more zip and ping and less alcohol. Growers of steely-detailed wines in every vintage made very high-toned wines indeed in ’08. The vintage favored the ones whose wines are creamier, by giving them a shapeliness and mineral nuance they usually lack.

It would be very hard to source new agencies by tasting their ‘08s. The vintage is so homogenous it’s hard to see who stands out. What stands out are great vineyards. Who stands out is harder because everyone’s wines were good.

An aside, if I may. I don’t know of any other wine culture where growers are under such a feverish microscope as in Austria. There are at least four major journals/commentators writing notes and reviews and tip-sheets and pecking orders, and if you’re good at all your name will show up. If you’re not good you’ll either be ignored (which sucks when all your neighbors are rolling in ink) or pilloried, and so there’s a serious incentive to make good wine. It looks silly sometimes, all this hyper-ventilating over “The top-10 Rosés under 5 Euro!” but it’s probably all good, because I think the baseline quality in Austria is shockingly high. I mean if you were paragliding and got blown off course and came gormlessly down in some random winery, you could be almost certain the wines would be good. Would this be true in, say, the Maconnais? The Loire? Umbria? Even the Mosel??

To be sure, there’s a crucial distinction between good and remarkable, competent and inspiring, and there’s always a reason to seek out the best. But if the best guy’s door is locked, chances are you won’t mind drinking the neighbor’s wine. Austria’s is a wine culture in ruddy good health, at least in this regard.

They say that lighter wines take longer to recover from bottling. I tasted during a 10-day period from very late April into the first ten days of May, and so many wines were so similar I suspect I couldn’t see their identifying fruit or mineral notes. My “narrow band” of quality may end up not so narrow after all. We’ll see.

Willi Bründlmayer told me I’d like the vintage; “It’s for classicists like you,” he said. I saw him late, by which time I’d tasted maybe a hundred wines all buzzing with mint and mineral but wanting perhaps just a little more fruit. Willi’s own wines, which I feared might be austere, were in fact beautiful, gracious, wines of stature and a finely poised richness. Erich Berger bless his heart, took heed of the acids and let a teensy bit of sweetness remain in his wines almost across the board. His ‘08s are standouts, singular, and simply more beautiful than so many others.

The best of the reds, of course, won’t really be ready to taste until next year, but the early fruit-driven ones were completely surprising. The wines burst with fruit. With the whites so taut I thought the reds would be mingy, but only the late-ripening Blaufränkisch presented problems, and even then not everywhere.

To sum it all up: the brighter you like your (white) wines, the more you’ll like the 2008s. Bright is not a euphemism for unripe or lean. It means bracing, it means bright! You may not miss the swell of power or the capacious fruit and terroir notes that riper vintages show, because you’re concerned with the demands their alcohols make. There are monuments in ’08, but not as many as in riper years. Yet, the ’08 monuments are vastly easier to drink than their counterparts in, say, 2006.

2008 favors neither Riesling nor Grüner Veltliner; it depends on the winery. It is, though, a vintage where the two are sometimes hard to tell apart. GrüVes are often narrowed and raised by ‘08’s structures. They seem more Riesling-y. But maybe Riesling’s pitted-fruit notes are still in hiding.

Most growers said, “Considering how incredibly difficult the vintage and the harvest were, the results are surprisingly good.” I agree.

WINERY OF THE VINTAGE

Much as I hate to repeat, facts are facts, and once again HIRSCH  is the top dawg. Attention must be paid to ALZINGER  as well, who had a stunning collection that was as existentially Other as some of Dönnhoff’s vintages are. But ‘Hannes Hirsch pulled a rabbit out of a hat – a bio-dynamic rabbit – with his ‘08s, especially considering the nightmarish conditions that sometimes prevailed in the vineyards.

COLLECTION OF THE OFFERING

Because it consists of several vintages, it is again, and emphatically, NIKOLAIHOF. They don’t seem to be uneven at all any more. These will never be clamorous noisy wines, but their moderate breathy style seems to have absorbed more jazz somehow. You’ll love and understand them even if you’re not Meister Eckhart or a member of his family.

GRU-VE OF THE VINTAGE

Indeed it is JAMEK,  for their supernal terroir monument the ACHLEITEN SMARAGD.

Amongst a bevy of worthy runners-up, these stand out: ECKER’S Prämium, HIRSCH’S Lamm, ALZINGERS, oh, everything, SALOMON’S Vom Stein Reserve, HIEDLER’S Thal, and NIKOLAIHOF’S absurdly good Hefeabzug.

The one wine that’s better than it has ever been is an arresting Mühlpoint Federspiel from ALZINGER.

RIESLING OF THE VINTAGE

Gotta give it up to BRUNDLMAYER’S Lyra, if for no other reason than I found the wine literally impossible to spit. Other wines almost or maybe just as good that I did somehow drool like a baboon into the bucket include NIGL’S gorgeous Privat, HIEDLER’S sexy Maximum, ALZINGER’S oh, everything again, both of HIRSCH’S single-vineyards (Gaisberg and Heiligenstein), and a remarkable bottling from HOFER.

MUSCAT OF THE VINTAGE

Yay, BERGER without a doubt.

ROSE OF THE VINTAGE

More of these all the time, and all of them good at doing what good Rosés do, but the best one was: BRUNDLMAYER’S Zweigelt Rosé,   simply in a class by itself, and substantive enough for year-round drinking.

VALUES OF THE VINTAGE

LEHRNER’S Blaufränkisch Ried Gfanger

GOBELSBURG’S Zweigelt from the “Domaine Gobelsburg” series.

ECKER’S Riesling Wasn

ECKER’S Zweigelt Brillant

WINES YOU’D LIKELY OVERLOOK, BUT SHOULDN’T

PRIELER’S Leithaberg White

NIKOLAIHOF’S Muskateller (Zen meets id in this insanely pretty wine)

SETZER’S Roter Veltliner Kreimelberg

THE WINE OF THE OFFERING

SCHLOSS GOBELSBURG’S 2007 Riesling Tradition, for its soul-drenched antique beauty. But remember, this isn’t always the “best” wine in the offering; it is the most noteworthy and remarkable, and Michi’s ’07 is one of the most stirring white wines you’ll ever drink. Whether it is “as good” as NIKOLAIHOF’S 2005 Steiner Hund Riesling Reserve is a question of conjecture. I anticipated the Steiner Hund would astonish, and it does. But that 2007 was a culmination of every beautiful thing he seeks to make of his “Tradition” bottlings, and as singular and mystical a Riesling as you’ll ever taste.