The other day in Berlin a shower drove me into the next available shelter and fortunately it was a wine bar: ‘Habel Weinkultur’, where I always wanted to visit (www.wein-habel.de).
The place is huge with various rooms and bars. It is also a place with tradition. Habel attempts to revive the old tradition of Prussia’s wine tasting. Originally it was located at Unter den Linden 30 were it was opened in 1779!
The elegant dining and tasting rooms of Habel Weinkultur
I was the only customer at 15:00 h in the afternoon but I was lucky again, they served customers.
The wine list was beautiful, however, a single person can only drink wine ‘glass wise’ and not by the bottle. I have to come again, I thought, with a friend to sample some of these wines. The food menu looked also very inviting. A good place to visit in Berlin.
I settled for a Riesling of course, this time I choose a Riesling from the Rheingau, one of the best German wine regions, a ‘2005 Riesling Schloss Vollrads’ (4.70 €/0.2 ltr.), a dry wine with a lush bouquet of apples (not a citrus bomb), fruity, well balanced acids, fresh with a nice finish.
When I studied the wine list I found that it contained many wines from Germany, France, Italy, Austria, Spain, Chile, Argentina and South Africa but only one single wine from Australia (a Penfolds BIN 2 Shiraz Mourvédre).
Of course with a wine from Penfolds you cannot go wrong but apart from the corporates there are zillions of excellent wines from small wineries and vineyards which would deserve to be sampled by the German wine lovers.
Address:
Habel Weinkultur
Luisenstrasse 19
10117 Berlin
Ph.: +49-30-28098484
The Man from Mosel River 