Domaine Marcel Deiss: The Alsace Rebel

How to Complete

3 steps curated by Wine Memories

1. 🍷 1

   Book a Domain Tour

   wine $$$

   Understand complantation - the practice of mixing grape varieties.

   Book at marceldeiss.fr - tours from €50+. Jean-Michel Deiss revived the medieval practice of complantation - planting multiple varieties together. Pinot Noir, Riesling, Gewurztraminer grow side by side in the same rows. The wines are labeled by terroir (Altenberg, Schoenenbourg) not grape.

   🍷 Log Memory
2. 🍷 2

   Taste a Single-Variety vs Complantation

   wine $$$

   Compare a pure Pinot Noir to a field blend including Pinot.

   Request to compare a single-variety Pinot Noir with a Grand Cru that includes Pinot in the complantation. Notice how the field blend creates complexity impossible to achieve with single varieties. This is wine philosophy as much as agriculture.

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3. ⛰️ 3

   Walk the Altenberg de Bergheim

   Optional

   adventure Free

   Grand Cru terroir where complantation changed Alsace law.

   Ask the domain for directions to the Altenberg de Bergheim Grand Cru. Walk the slopes and see different varieties planted together in the same rows. Deiss's fight to label wines by terroir (not variety) changed Alsace AOC regulations in 2005.

   🍷 Log Memory

Insider Tips

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  Deiss's complantation wines changed Alsace AOC law in 2005 - now terroir names are permitted

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  The medieval tradition was planting all varieties together - Deiss revived what industrialization killed

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  Highly intellectual wines - bring your thinking cap

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  The domain is in Bergheim, a beautiful walled village on the Route du Vin