Me and the Hungarian Pinot Noir

Drinking a lot of wine has never been a problem to me. So starting up a collection, however, had to be a decision rather than just a necessity (of storing what I could not drink). First I stopped buying wines for a while when I realized the impact of warmth to wines in the house. Then I slowed down again when I realized that my 6-7 years old items stopped improving, in fact most of them started a process of disintegration as I call it, or blowing up into pieces. I am more careful now, although I still don’t have the rule or right formula to pick the ones that will improve over time and which can and worth to be matured in my dad’s cellar for 5-10-15 years (the Hungarian versions of Parkers and alike can help sometimes though). Since this is still more or less a lottery, I decided to share my experiences with You in order that You avoid the same mistakes, or follow my occasional good decisions so You can enjoy these aged treasures as well. My advices will be useful, believe me, since most of Hungarian wine makers tend to produce unequal quality year-by-year, unlike many of the industrialized counterparts in the new world and in western Europe. Even the tricky old names can surprise you with their experimentalism, and not in a good way.

I feel sometimes desperate when I descend to the cellar and I must pick the items for that week (I usually visit the cellar 1x or max 2x a month) and I was particularly concerned about the Vylyan Pinot Noir 2003. First, Pinot Noir is a very difficult task to accomplish, but apparently Hunagarians proved to be extremely adventurous in the new millenium. The thing is, I’ve never found a nice Pinot Noir in Hungary. And Villány, with its Mediterranean micro-climate was not very promising either (Vylyan planted the pinots to the cooler western slopes though). And this is exactly what I really enjoy, opening up a bottle in a typically awful monday evening with a sound pre-concept and then…It’s not so bad after all, even just after opening the bottle, it is quite promising, despite the blurred color which indicates the age (and wines from the 90s always make me suspicious). Blueberry is the word I am looking for and the finish is first quick, smooth, almost velvet, and a silent, long velvet ending will last until the next sip. 3 hours later slight improvement in (already surprisingly good) texture, but no perfum as you would expect only some cinnamon. But I like the finish very much.

The disappointment came when I checked one day later the price of it and its price tag above HUF 4000 (EUR 17) hardly qualifies it for best buy. It’s still a relatively fair price, but only just and only compared to other Hungarian Pinots.

Overall score: 5+/6- (appr. 83)