Hilltop Chardonnay, 2006

I’ve been impressed by the outstanding and professional marketing achievements of Hilltop ever since I’ve seen their sexy Rosemount-like diamond label on the shelfs of supermarkets following their years of trade-marketing exercise in the UK. Hilltop is one of the best-run big wineries of Hungary with a remarkable output of over 7 million bottles a year (with an export of 6 million bottles to the UK alone!).

The Hilltop vinyards are simply fabulous. They overlook the Danube valley from heights of few hundreds of meters and their facilities are perfectly located and maintained.

The northern exposure of their slopes always concerned me and no wine has ever convinced me about the river’s heating/cooling mechanism which is supposed to enhance the wines’ quality by compensating for the lack on insolation. But writing an English blog about Hungarian wines I cann’t avoid Hilltop even if I wanted to (which I don’t). So I got this bottle as a present from a friend few days before the birth of their first child (to whom I wish all the best btw, although I doubt that my friend would ever suspect that I’m writing this blog, – no one does).

The review

Hilltop is a mid-range brand of Hilltop Neszmély winery.

The wine has a shiny, moderately light golden colour and a lazy, oily move. It smells honey and unripe apricot (yes, I do realise the apparent contradiction). On the palate it delivers the same savors. You could tell that this is a late harvest dry wine and it’s overly sweet, alhough it’s not. I hope you know what I mean. The sweetness is accompanied by a right amount of acid but it’s not sufficient to compenstate it, nor does the grapefruit flavour.

Score: 3, 3+

Price: HUF 1 400