Caroline and Sylvain Diel truly convinced us. There is a great winery in the Nahe region that can do it all. Take a huge family heritage, produce the best Pinots, Rieslings and sparkling wines and be great parents of three. Our visit to winery Schlossgut Diel…

The castle tower has new battlements, but at some point, new plaster will be needed. What a crazy sentence to start a blog post about a winery. But this winery has its home base in a beautiful castle – the winery Schlossgut Diel. A perfect playground for three kids by the way. But we will get there step by step.

You can spot the building from the distance. A big signage “Schloßgut Diel” will guide you. When we arrived at the castle, the clouds came down from the sky and the whole scenery was covered more and more in fog. But that was only the weather – in our minds and in our glasses the sun was going up.

We just talked and talked and talked

The first one we immediately fell in love with was Sylvain. He is the husband of Caroline Diel, who runs the winery. And he was our first contact on site. The mixture of his heartwarming character, French accent and his wonderful sense of humor is simply irresistible. Later we learned that his role is even bigger. He makes the whole thing feel so easy. On a somehow typical working day we saw him pack up wines and send them out, be a perfect host for the guests, answer the winery phone, cook some French food, pick up the kids from school, and many more things.

After driving through the vineyards with Caroline – which was super interesting and where we learned a lot – we spend most of our time in the winery just sitting together with both of them in their kitchen. Talking about life, kids, great wines, family, parents and winemaking. It felt like an old friendship. Just a great couple.

And then there is “super-woman” Caroline

A lot of things have been published about Caroline Diel recently. She has been named “Winemaker of the Year” by famous German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. She has been called “allrounder”, “talent” and “super-woman”. She deals with three children, many vineyards, a team and quite a burden of expectations. But she does it so cool, simply impressive.

Maybe she has more talent than anyone else before in the family. Or a better education. Or both. The result of it is simply stunning. Caroline Diel presents Rieslings of many styles – basically you can call it the best of Moselle, Rhine and Palatinate because of its different characters and terroirs. She also presents leading sparkling wines and fantastic Pinots. Each one among the best in all Germany.

Caroline went through a crazy education. Learning from her father, studying in Geisenheim, working at Château Pichon-Lalande in Bordeaux, Robert Weil, Rebholz, Toni Jost und Dr. Deinhard in Germany, Champagne house Ruinart in Reims, France, at the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti in Burgundy, at winery Verlegen in South Africa and winery Rippon Estate in New Zealand. Learning from the best to become the best.

But that does not seem to be the only reason for her huge success. Maybe it is because she was underestimated on her way sometimes. Maybe she was compared to her father for too long. Maybe she has the strong will to prove what she is able to do. The result is definitely good news for every wine lover.

The Diel way of great wine

She has a certain idea of the wines – their freshness, their creaminess and how crisp and juicy they have to be. And she carries that through all quality levels. The wines are deep and very well structured.

The Pittermännchen GG Riesling was hugely impressive as it was already so juicy while still having great years ahead. While the Burgberg has it all when it comes to being the high-end Riesling of the winery. Also the Cuvee Mo Sekt was unbelievably convincing. Same is true for the Pinot Noir Caroline. We had a wonderful tasting.

All our tasting notes can be found HERE.

Schlossgut Diel KG
Burg Layen 16
55452 Rümmelsheim
Germany

Visit website of winemaker Schlossgut Diel.