Three Black Forest vermouths from Freiburg, built on Kaiserstuhl Pinot and botanicals sourced from the surrounding forest.
The producer
Apros is a Freiburg vermouth producer founded in 2019 by Matthias Sasse, Achim Berger, and winemaker Johannes von Gleichenstein. The three expressions, White, Rosé, and Red, are built on Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris from the Kaiserstuhl, the volcanic hill south of Freiburg, and flavoured with approximately sixteen botanicals drawn predominantly from the Black Forest. The Rosé carries rosemary, pink pepper, orange peel, angelica root, liquorice, and eucalyptus, and finishes with bitter orange and a dry herbal edge. All three vermouths are 18% ABV.
Known for
Black Forest Pinot-based vermouth
Notable facts
Founded in Freiburg in 2019 by Matthias Sasse, Achim Berger, and Johannes von Gleichenstein.
Base wines are Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris from the Kaiserstuhl in Baden.
Approximately sixteen botanicals, sourced predominantly from the Black Forest region.
All three vermouths are bottled at 18% ABV.
The story
The Wild Boar Label
When Sasse, Berger, and von Gleichenstein were settling on a name for their Freiburg vermouth project, they reached into Latin rather than into aperitif tradition. The word they chose was *apros*, the Latin for wild boar, an animal native to the Black Forest that frames the city on three sides. The choice was deliberate: the wild boar lives in the same landscape the botanicals come from, and the name put that geography on the label from the first release in 2019.
The Wild Boar Label
When Sasse, Berger, and von Gleichenstein were settling on a name for their Freiburg vermouth project, they reached into Latin rather than into aperitif tradition. The word they chose was *apros*, the Latin for wild boar, an animal native to the Black Forest that frames the city on three sides. The choice was deliberate: the wild boar lives in the same landscape the botanicals come from, and the name put that geography on the label from the first release in 2019.
From the atlas
Apros
Three Baden Pinot-based vermouths from Freiburg, where the Black Forest supplies both the name and most of the botanicals.
At A Glance
Region
Baden, Germany
Base wine
Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris (Kaiserstuhl)
Style
Vermouth (White, Rosé, Red)
ABV
18%
Defining feature
Botanicals sourced predominantly from the Black Forest region
The Producer
Apros makes three vermouths in Freiburg, in the Black Forest edge of Baden. Matthias Sasse, restaurateur Achim Berger, and winemaker Johannes von Gleichenstein founded the company in 2019. Von Gleichenstein brought the base wine connection: Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris from the Kaiserstuhl, the volcanic hill south of Freiburg that produces some of Baden's warmest and most concentrated Pinot fruit. The botanicals, around sixteen in total, come predominantly from the surrounding Black Forest. Both the wine and the plants share the same landscape, giving a three-expression range built on a clear regional logic.
The name encodes that logic. In Latin, apros means wild boar, an animal native to the Black Forest. The founders chose it deliberately: not a word from the aperitif vocabulary, but from the forest itself.
Place
Freiburg sits at the western edge of the Black Forest, where the Vosges-Schwarzwald trough brings together some of Baden's warmest vineyards and one of Germany's most diverse foraging landscapes. The Kaiserstuhl, the volcanic outcrop that forms Apros's Pinot source, sits in the Rhine plain between Freiburg and the Alsace border. Its basalt and loess soils warm quickly in spring and hold heat through the growing season, giving Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris the ripeness and body to function as a fortified base wine. Baden's classification as one of Germany's warmest wine regions is visible in those grapes: fuller, softer, and more texture-rich than Pinot from cooler German zones.
Wines
The range is White, Rosé, and Red, all at 18% ABV. The Rosé is the most fully documented of the three. It is built on Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris from the Kaiserstuhl and carries approximately sixteen botanicals, including rosemary, pink pepper, orange peel, angelica root, liquorice, and eucalyptus. In the glass it gives bitter orange, a subtle herbal sharpness, and a finish of delicate bitterness. The White and Red expressions draw on the same Pinot-from-Baden foundation and the same Black Forest botanical sourcing, completing a range intended for service on ice, long with tonic, or in Negroni and Americano builds where the botanical weight holds against the other spirits.
Final Word
Apros anchors its three vermouths to one landscape: Kaiserstuhl Pinot as the base, Black Forest plants as the botanical layer, and Freiburg as the address. The Rosé shows how that combination works in the glass, with bitter orange, pink pepper, and a dry, herb-edged finish.