Nusserhof, Südtirol Lagrein Riserva

Nusserhof is one of the most extraordinary wine farms in Italy. You’ve heard of “urban” winemaking? Well, this is the purest example there is: The Mayr family has farmed the same land in the city of Bolzano since the late 1700s, but where there were once other farms surrounding them, there’s now a city on all sides. Their 2.5-hectare vineyard and family home is now an organic oasis within an urban environment. High-speed trains zip past the vineyard’s eastern border and the farm’s walnut trees (for which the winery is named) were cut down to make way for a bike path, but still, Heinrich and Elda Mayr grow the local Lagrein and make what is arguably the greatest expression of the variety out there. Nusserhof is the kind of singular producer we delight in featuring on SommSelect: You’ve seen this wine before, and you’ll see it again (when we can get it) because it is such a uniquely delicious snapshot of a place—namely, the still-bucolic, German-speaking Alto Adige, or Südtirol (South Ty