A wine tasting, made around the Olaszrizling (welschriesling) grape.
It has been some time since I’ve wrote something, mainly cause my wine fridge broke down and I had to find a place for over 150 bottles to be stored on a safe temperature. But I will make it up with this bigger article about the big Olaszrizling tasting I was at yesterday in one of the nicer hotels in Budapest, called the Sofitel.
There were over 60 wineries attending and they all brought one or more types of Olaszrizling to taste. It’ was a great opportunity to get to known new people and taste their wines. Below you can see a picture of the attending wineries.
The tasting notes
- Cziszár Családi pince
A small family winery in the wine region Balatonfüred-Csopak, they own 10 hectares of land and make wine with modern technology but they still follow the traditional ways.
Very nice smell, rather complex, smell hints of the nature and fresh leaves, with minerals.. which is typical to the region.
In the taste you can find white pepper and spices with bitter almonds, the wine has very elegant characteristics for it’s age.
- Szent Donát Birtok
Another winery in the Balatonfüred-Csopak wine region, having 7 hectares of land. The produce between 25.000 and 30.000 thousand bottles a year and they all reflect the characteristics of the region, wines full of minerals. We had 6 wines to compare to each other
Csopak 2013 : Made with grapes from the Csopak and Paloznak mountains. Soil consistent of clay, red clay and loess . Very smooth flavors, the minerals stand out a lot in both the flavor and the smell, a complex and elegant wine.
Meszes 2013 : Pretty much the same as the Csopak one, but this is is less smooth and has more acids in it and has hints of spices.
Bérekhát 2013 : Comes from the Csopak wine hills, rich in red sandstone and clay. It has a creamy flavor and is soft in flavors cause of this. It goes without saying that this wine has a lot of minerals in it as well.
Nagykút 2013 : Comes from the Csopak wine hills as well, the slopes are called Nagykun and are more limestone rich with clay. This wine has more acidity then the Bérekhát and also has a longer after taste of minerals.
Kishegy 2013 : Comes again from the Csopak wine hills, the slopes are called Kishegy and are very limestone rich. The riesling grapes used for this wine are very old and provide the highest possible quality of wine.
- Hilltop
A winery from Neszmély, a wine region north west of Budapest and to the east of the city Győr. They have a total of ! 560 hectares which 400 are on the Neszmélyi hills and 160 are in Szekszárd. They produce around 9 million bottles a year. The winery exports 90 per cent of their wines up-road which is a rare thing among Hungarian wineries. In 1998 they’ve won the first prize in the Wine Challenge, in 2004 they were also name winery of the year. Their head winemaker, Ákos Kamocsay won the winemaker of the year award in 1997 in the Uk and wine producer of the year in Hungary two years later.
This wine was a real pearl, it had the minerals in and was fresh and fruity at the same time. Some exotic fruits come to mind in he flavors, like mango and passion fruits.
The wine also won a list of awards; here are a few of the gold medal awards they have won, cause summing them all up would be to long.
- Les Citadelles du Vin, Bordeaux – Gold Medal, Hungary Special Prize
- VinAgora International Wine Competition – Gold Medal, VinoFed Special Prize
- Magyar Bormustra (XXXVI. National and Carpathian Basin Wine Competition) – Gold Medal
- Mun-Dus International Wine Competition – Gold Medal
- Szeremley Birtok ( previously known as Szent Orbán pince)
I will update the section when I can find some information about them which is correct; at the meantime I will share my tasting notes of three rather extraordinary yet good wines.
Badacsonyi Olaszrizling 1995; a full bodied white wine, hints of honey with linden. It was a little bit to strong for my personal flavor, had a nice dark yellow color.
A late harvest wine from 2000 made from Olaszrizling (forgot to take a picture); this very well could have been an award winning late harvest if it came from Tokaj, the flavors were in perfect harmony and had hints of honey and linden as well. Very smooth no heavy acids in the after taste. First time I drank a late harvest made from Olaszrizling.
The youngest of the three wines we tried; a fresh and fruity summer wine with a high acid content.
It’s ideal to start a meal with or to just drink on its own during a hot summer day or evening.
Citrus fruits come to mind in the flavor as well as in the smell.
In my next article I will talk about two Croatian wineries, I have met on this tasting and will certainly visit them.
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