Situated in Leiwen in the heart of Mosel, St. Laurentius is not your typical Mosel winery. As the title suggests, St. Laurentius primarily produces sekt and it all started when Klaus Herres-Wener took over from his father in 1982. Despite being a novice at sparkling wine, Klaus Herres-Wener was determined to turn his riesling grapes into sekt.

Starting up, Klaus Herres collected used champagne bottles and second hand corking equipment picked up from Champagne flea markets. Initially, production proved challenging and dangerous as several bottles exploded in the cellar. In those early days Klaus Herres wore thick gloves, a motorcycle helmet and a padded ski jacket when turning the bottles.

A lot has happened since for the sekt pioneers of Mosel and today they are widely considered as one of Germany's top sekt producers. They produce a wide variety of sekts made from riesling, spätburgunder, weißburgunder, chardonnay, St. Laurent and auxeroise. The fermentation takes place in stainless steel and the rieslings undergo a partly malolactic fermentation. The wines undergo a classic champagne style secondary fermentation for a minimum of 9 months. The annual production is 80.000 bottles and their bottling facilities are used by other producers in the area, bringing the total number of bottles filled at the winery up to a massive 330.000 per year.

We visited St. Laurentius earlier this year to taste their wines.