Huxelrebe is an early-21st-century German vine cross that enjoys some popularity both in Germany and, on a much smaller scale, in england. Although like scheurebe and faberrebe it was actually bred by Georg Scheu at Alzey, this cross takes its name from its chief propagator, nurseryman Fritz Huxel. It was bred in 1927 from gutedel (Chasselas) and Courtillier Musqué (which is also an antecedent of the popular hybrid maréchal foch). The cross is capable of producing enormous quantities of rather ordinary wine—so enormous in fact that the vines can collapse under the strain. If pruned carefully, however, and planted on an average to good site, it can easily reach Auslese must weights even in an ordinary year and produce a fulsome if not exactly subtle wine redolent of honey, musk, and raisins for reasonably early consumption. In England, its ripeness is a useful counterbalance to naturally high acidity. In Germany, it is grown almost exclusively in the Pfalz and Rheinhessen and, although it continues to lose ground, there were still 548 ha/1,354 acres in 2012. Gysler and Seehof manage to spin gold from it.
