Site and Setting
The vineyard covers roughly five hectares set within a larger property of meadow and mixed woodland, well above and apart from the warm plain where most Mittelhaardt Riesling grows. Standing so high and enclosed by forest, the site is cooler than the vineyards below Wachenheim. It lies near the old basalt quarry at the Pechsteinkopf, on ground shaped by ancient volcanic activity, with the estate's neoclassical villa set directly above it. The estate as a whole farms about 6.8 hectares, of which the Odinstal monopole is the core; its other holdings include the Wachenheimer Schloßberg and Altenburg (both VDP.ERSTE LAGE) and a parcel in Kallstadt's Saumagen (VDP.GROSSE LAGE).
Four Soils in One Vineyard
What sets Odinstal apart from its neighbours is its geology. Where Mittelhaardt soils are usually jumbled together, here four different rock types occur in separate zones within one small vineyard: basalt, buntsandstein (red sandstone), muschelkalk (shell limestone) and keuper (marl). The presence of volcanic basalt is itself unusual for the Pfalz. The parcels face broadly south and southeast, with the basalt and sandstone blocks on south-facing ground and the limestone on a gentler east-tending slope. The estate makes this the organising idea of its range, bottling separate cuvées named for the rock they grow on, among them Riesling from basalt, Riesling from buntsandstein and Silvaner from muschelkalk, alongside wines labelled by their elevation above sea level.
History and Ownership
The estate dates to the early nineteenth century, when a mayor of Wachenheim laid out the vineyard. It changed hands several times over the following generations before Thomas and Ute Hensel bought it in 1998. The first wines under the Odinstal label were released from the 2004 vintage.
Farming and Wines
Because Odinstal is a monopole, Weingut Odinstal is the only producer of the site. Andreas Schumann has run both vineyard and cellar since 2004. The vines are farmed biodynamically, a practice adopted in 2006, and the estate holds Demeter certification, with its first fully certified vintage in 2013. Work in the cellar is deliberately minimal: spontaneous fermentation without temperature control, long ageing on the lees and sparing use of sulphur. The plantings are all white, led by Riesling and Silvaner alongside Weißburgunder, Auxerrois, Rieslaner and Gewürztraminer. As a VDP.GROSSE LAGE, the estate's dry wines from the site qualify as Grosses Gewächs.