Egon Müller-Scharzhof

For many centuries the Scharzhofberg belonged to the church, which was expropriated during the French Revolution. Jean-Jacques Koch (1762-1829) acquired the Scharzhof in 1797 from the post-revolutionary French Republic. In 1829 the estate was divided among his seven children. His daughter Elisabeth married Felix Müller (1789-1859), a soldier in the Napoleonic wars who had come to the Saar from Föhrenbach in the Black Forest; inherited and purchased vineyards soon doubled the couple's holding. In 1887 their second son, Egon Müller I, married Therese Tuckermann of Cologne, and her father Eduard Tuckermann bought a share in the winery from Egon's sister Felicitas for 150,000 gold marks. The family took presentation booths at the world exhibitions, and in 1900 the Scharzhofberg wines were shown at the Exposition Universelle in Paris. After Egon Müller I, the estate was divided between his sons Egon and Felix; Felix went his own way. Egon Müller II (1887-1941) ran the winery for only a few years, and his wife Elisabeth then managed it through the war years with the support of their daughters Marie-Therese and Marianne. Egon Müller III (1919-2001) returned home on 15 August 1945; his first harvest brought only 1,200 litres of Riesling from what were then 7.4 hectares. In 1954 he bought the neighbouring Le Gallais estate from Madame Rochon de Pons. From 1985 to 1991 he managed the Scharzhof together with his son, Egon Müller IV, who has run it since 1991.

• Felix Müller (Scharzhofberger) was among the wineries that announced auctions in March 1865.
• Le Gallais brought half of the 2.5 hectares in the Wiltingen sites Kupp and braune Kupp, with the other half leased; these acquisitions completed the estate's growth in land.
• Some dry wines were made from 1980 to 1997, then production was halted.

Egon Müller IV owns and runs the estate; the VDP lists Egon Müller as owner. Heiner Bollig is cellar master and decides, by vintage and grape condition, whether the grapes are first pressed or pressed as lightly crushed, whole berries. Egon Müller V was born in 2000. Under Egon Müller III, the cellarmaster and winemaker was Horst Frank, who retired in 2000.

• Egon Müller-Scharzhof chaired the VDP.Mosel-Saar-Ruwer from 2008 to 2016.
• The estate is a member of Primum Familiae Vini, an association of twelve wine families; Egon Müller held its presidency for 2016/2017.
• Château Belá, in Slovakia's Stúrovo region, was set up as a joint venture between Egon Müller and the family of Baron Georg Ullman de Baranyavá, the former owner of that estate; its debut release was the 2001 vintage, with Miroslav Petrech retained as cellar master.

The Scharzhofberg is the steep hill behind the Scharzhof manor, today some 28 hectares in extent; until 1971 it was limited to 18 hectares. Its soil is deep, weathered blue and grey slate. The estate owns 8.5 hectares of it, and other proprietors include Kesselstatt and van Volxem. A 2-hectare block behind the house was planted on ungrafted vines in about 1900. In the braune Kupp the slate carries a good portion of iron, which gives the site its name. The braune Kupp is one of the warmest sites on the Saar, while the Scharzhofberg is one of the coolest Riesling vineyards in the region.

• Some vines are still on their original roots and date back to the 19th century.
• Yields never exceed 60 hectolitres per hectare and are most of the time as low as 30.
• The soil is ploughed up to six times a year; no chemical fertilizers, herbicides or insecticides are used, and as few fungicides as possible.
• The vineyards are not treated against botrytis.

All grapes are harvested by hand and carried in small containers to the press house. For the nobly sweet wines, pickers carry two baskets, one for healthy berries and one for berries with noble rot. After pressing, the must settles for 24 hours before it goes into Fuder casks or stainless steel tanks. Fermentation is usually spontaneous and often stops by itself in the cool cellar before the wine is dry, which leaves the fruit sweetness; genuinely dry Scharzhofberg Rieslings are bottled only in very few years. In a good year nothing is added except sulphur, and the wines are not fined. Early in the year after harvest the wines are drawn off the lees and gently filtered, and the estate prefers early bottling; the best casks of a vintage are bottled separately.

• Grapes are pressed without any period of skin contact.
• The 1976 Trockenbeerenauslese fermented so slowly that it could not be bottled until 1981.

The range climbs from the entry-level Scharzhof through Kabinett, Spätlese and Auslese to Beerenauslese, Trockenbeerenauslese and Eiswein. The Scharzhof is made from the estate's vineyards in Saarburg and Oberemmel and the Wiltingen sites Braunfels and Kupp, and in some vintages also takes grapes from the braune Kupp and the Scharzhofberg. Only the Prädikat wines from the Scharzhofberg and the Wiltinger braune Kupp carry the site name on the label. The Kabinett wines usually carry 7 to 10% alcohol. Egon Müller III first made Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese at the Scharzhof in 1959. The estate was one of the first in Germany to make Eiswein, with 1961 the first commercial vintage; Eiswein grapes are picked early in the morning at the first severe frost of minus seven degrees and pressed while still frozen.

• Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese from the Scharzhofberg: 1971, 1975, 1976, 1989, 1990, 1994, 1995, 1999, 2001, 2003, 2005 and 2015.
• Beerenauslese only: 1979, 1983, 1986, 1988, 1991 and 1993.
• Trockenbeerenauslese only: 1997, 2000, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2023.

The VDP records the 2003 Scharzhofberger Riesling Trockenbeerenauslese, sold for 14,566 euros a bottle at the VDP.Mosel auction in 2015, as the world's highest-ever price for a bottle of wine. In the VDP's auction history, 22 bottles of that wine changed hands at the Trier autumn auction at 12,000 euros net each, and 36 half bottles at 5,500 euros net each. At the 131st Grosser Ring auction in Trier in 2018, a 2017 Scharzhofberger "Alte Rebe" Kabinett from the estate sold for 200 euros net a bottle, a world record for a Kabinett wine.

• Decanter named the 1976 Scharzhofberger Trockenbeerenauslese a Wine Legend in 2017; Stephen Brook judged the TBA the greatest of the Scharzhof wines.

The estate's working philosophy rests on a maxim of Egon Müller III: "The quality of a wine originates 100 percent in the vineyard." In the estate's own account, the braune Kupp Spätlese wines tend to be rather full-bodied and spicy-exotic, while the Scharzhofberg Spätlese develops toward great elegance that can no longer be categorized as "sweet" or "dry." The estate calls its Kabinett wines fresh and lively when young, able to age elegantly for ten or more years, and rates the 1998 as probably the best Eiswein it has pressed.

Primary sources (producer's own site): https://www.egon-mueller.de/en_US/history, https://www.egon-mueller.de/en_US/vineyard, https://www.egon-mueller.de/en_US/wine-cellar, https://www.egon-mueller.de/en_US/wines, https://www.egon-mueller.de/en_US/pfv. Official body (VDP. Die Prädikatsweingüter): https://www.vdp.de/de/die-weine/weinbergonline/weingut/egon-mueller-scharzhof, https://www.vdp.de/en/der-vdp/vdpauctions/the-history-of-auctions, https://www.vdp.de/en/the-wines/the-vdpregions/mosel. Secondary sources: Decanter (Stephen Brook, 8 January 2017), https://www.decanter.com/learn/wine-legend-egon-muller-scharzhof-tba-1976-352334/; Wine Spectator, https://www.winespectator.com/articles/germanys-egon-muller-releases-91-point-riesling-from-slovakia-21568. Last verified 2026-10-14. Where the producer's site and a secondary source disagree, the producer's site governs.