Ancestrale Fleur – Demi Sec

Ancestrale Fleur is scented with elderflower, pear, and lychee

The Ancestrale Fleur Demi Sec is a medium-dry sparkling wine made from pure Scheurebe, which the Raumland sparkling wine estate produces according to the Méthode Ancestrale. Its sweetness does not come from a dosage, but from the fermentation process itself, which was stopped at just the right time.

Ancestrale Fleur Demi Sec is the fruity, sweet sparkling wine from the Raumland sparkling wine estate in Flörsheim-Dalsheim, pressed from 100 percent Scheurebe. It went by the name Fleur Doux for almost twenty years; as of the 2021 vintage, it bears the new name and belongs to the Raumland Manufacture line. A sparkling wine for everyone who likes it floral and soft.

A bouquet of elderflower and lychee

On the nose, Ancestrale Fleur is scented with elderflowers, ripe pears, and lychee, like a summer bouquet that someone has placed into the glass.

On the palate, the residual sweetness of 42 grams per liter is apparent, but it does not feel heavy on the tongue. This is ensured by 9 grams of acidity, which provides a counterweight to the sweetness and brings aromas of lime and freshly picked grapes to the fore. It is fruity, fragrant, and nimble in the glass, with a fine perlage and a finish that remains floral for a long time.

This floral quality is an inherent characteristic of the grape variety itself. Georg Scheu bred it in 1916 in Alzey, less than fifteen kilometers from the Raumland vineyards, and originally wanted to name it "Scheu's Darling." In the Rhenish-Hessian dialect, that sounded questionable, so it became Scheurebe.

With dessert, with cheese, for the first round

The low alcohol content makes it a sparkling wine for the early evening and for long summer days when a dry Brut would be too strict.

It is in its element with dessert because it doesn't have to fight against sweetness, but rather complements it: with fruit cake, panna cotta, or yellow fruit sorbet. It also pairs well with aged cheese, whose saltiness really wakes up the fruit.

Those who serve it as an aperitif should pour it well-chilled at 6 to 8 degrees Celsius, in a glass with a wider bowl instead of a narrow flute. It needs room to breathe; otherwise, the floral notes remain buried beneath the carbonation.

Stopping fermentation instead of adding dosage

The Méthode Ancestrale is the oldest way of making sparkling wine, and it involves no second fermentation. Volker Raumland cools the tank down while the base wine is still fermenting, so that the yeast stops and a portion of the grape sugar is preserved.

The wine then goes into the bottle partially fermented, where it finishes fermenting and creates its own carbonation. It is still riddled and disgorged by hand, but the dosage at the end is omitted entirely. What you taste in the glass is sugar from the grape and nothing that was added afterward.

Volker founded his sparkling wine estate in 1984 in Rheinhessen, now farms 14 hectares organically, and in 2020 became the first winery dedicated exclusively to sparkling wine to be admitted to the VDP. His daughters Katharina and Marie-Luise have been working in the business since 2019.

"When it comes to the quality of our sparkling wines, we make no compromises," the family says, and that also applies to the sweetest sparkling wine in their house. Hats off to them. You can find more sparkling wines from Flörsheim-Dalsheim with us, from light Secco to the vintages with long lees aging in our sparkling wine assortment.