Wine region
Schaffhausen
Schaffhausen, the Blauburgunderland: about 470 hectares in the Klettgau and along the Rhine, with Hallau, the largest wine commune of German Switzerland.
- Vineyard area
- about 470 hectares, the second-largest in German-speaking Switzerland
- Main grapes
- Blauburgunder (about 60 per cent), Riesling-Silvaner (about 15 per cent), Chardonnay, Pinot Gris
- Soils and climate
- deep chalky clay in the Klettgau, gravel and molasse by the Rhine; about 900 mm of rain, dry autumns
- Signature wines
- Hallauer Blauburgunder, Riesling-Silvaner, Spätlese from Pinot Noir
- Landmark
- Hallau with about 150 hectares, the largest contiguous vineyard in German-speaking Switzerland
Schaffhausen calls itself the Blauburgunderland, and the name says it all: about 60 per cent of the roughly 470 hectares of vines in Switzerland’s northernmost canton are planted with Pinot Noir, known here as Blauburgunder. More than two thirds of the area is red. The canton lies almost entirely on the right bank of the Rhine, tucked between the Black Forest and the Hegau, and enjoys a comparatively mild climate with a moderate 900 millimetres or so of rain; in the rain shadow of the Black Forest, summer and autumn usually stay dry, which suits the late-ripening Pinot Noir.
The wine area falls into four parts. The Klettgau in the west, with about 390 hectares, is the heart of the canton: at the southern foot of the Randen, the vine slope runs from Gächlingen through Oberhallau and Hallau to Trasadingen, joined by Wilchingen, Osterfingen and Siblingen. Hallau alone farms about 150 hectares, the largest contiguous vineyard in German-speaking Switzerland, and counts as its largest wine commune; the hill church above the vines is the village’s landmark. The deep chalky clay soils of the Klettgau give the Blauburgunder body and warmth. The town of Schaffhausen with its Munot fortress and the Reiat around Thayngen have about 28 hectares on lighter gravel and sand, Stein am Rhein about 32 hectares on the Wolkenstein slope, Buchberg and Rüdlingen in the south about 33 hectares on molasse and marl.
Among the whites, Riesling-Silvaner leads with about 15 per cent, followed by Chardonnay, Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc and fungus-resistant varieties such as Regent and Muscaris. Blauburgunder is made in every style, from the light Federweisser and Süssdruck through the classic Hallauer to the Spätlese, harvested at least ten days after the main harvest begins and often matured in wood.
Viticulture is old here: by around 1100 the All Saints monastery in Schaffhausen owned vineyards in Hallau, and in the late Middle Ages the town by the Rhine Falls was a centre of the eastern Swiss wine trade. As everywhere in German-speaking Switzerland, the area shrank in the 20th century, but since the 1990s Schaffhausen has built a reputation for serious Pinot Noir with low yields and barrique ageing; the growers’ cooperatives, above all in Hallau, still play a major role.
What to drink: a Hallauer Blauburgunder with Schaffhauser Bölletünne, the onion tart, a Riesling-Silvaner with fried fish from the Rhine, a Spätlese with roast pork, a Süssdruck as an aperitif in the Klettgau.