Ottó Légli has, in total, 33 ha vineyards mostly on the small hills of the Balatonboglár region. According to his credo, his aim is to make the wine express the utmost harmony of natural values of the wine such as fruitiness, acidity, freshness and of dedicated human efforts.The vine composition of the plantations is as follows:

Chardonnay 7,7 ha, Olaszrizling 5 ha, Rajnai Rizling 4,8 ha, Sauvignon Blanc 3,6 ha, Pinot Noir 4 ha, Merlot 2 ha, Kékfrankos 1 ha, Pinot Blanc 0,5 ha, Rizlingszilváni 0,4 ha, Muscat Ottonel 0,3 ha, Irsai Olivér 0,3 ha, Zenit 0,3 ha, Zöldveltelini 0,2 ha, under reconstruction 2,9 ha.

I picked an affordable middle-range wine (he produces wines for the budget consumers as well as for the wealthy Hungarians, and a range in between). I was a bit disappointed lately with the lower-end sortiment, so I’ve been looking forward to the more expensive range with mixed expectations.

Légli – Landord, 2007

Medium yellow-golden color, clean and bright and the wine has an appealing move in the glass.

This Chardonnay has a very attractive nose: intense, but very elegant acacia honey with floral edge. Very refreshing. It has a mouth-filling presence on the palate too with grapefruit and other citrus elements, supported by round, fresh, elegant acidity. Remarkable, excellent balance. More than medium bodied with a nice structure with a good deal of salty-minerality making it even more exciting, completed by an apricot aroma undertone. Complex, but not heavy wine, although heavy enough to accompany the 14% alcohol. The acids are lovely and they’re trimming well the residual sugar.

Later the nose will have a marzipan note too and the palate a more Chardonnay vinous character.

The smart use of polished oak is interesting and pleasant.

This is the last great Chardonnay in a row of three in only a few months. The three came from 3 different regions in the small Hungarian land. The three are priced around HUF 3 000 which, of course, qualifies them for best buy. Something to think about.

Score: 7, 7+

Price: 3 500 (on sale, normally 4 000)

Bright golden color, I expected darker, more brownish tone.

The nose is sulphuric with honey and floral notes of medium intensity (I expected more intense aromas).

On the palate it’s well structured, well integrated, nicely composed peanut butter and peanut  with elegant acidity and nice, smooth texture. There’s a tiny bitterness of walnut too. I suspect high level of alcohol, a bit burning. Round wine with some residual sugar embedded into the nice acidity. The burned sugar finish is long and very pleasant.

With time, lot of caramel with burnt walnut on the palate and a touch of vanilla. The wine stretches in the whole mouth from the peak of the tongue to the back-end, filling it with a smooth, velvety sensation. The nose becomes more marzipan-vanilla after an hour.

It well worths the price.

Score: 7-, 7 points

Price: HUF 3 000

I accidentally run into a Ráspi Sauvignon Blanc 2007 the other day in what many would describe as one of Budapest’s top restaurants. Well, the nose was quite promising too, but then the first sip was like my brains being smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick – sensation-wise (copyright D.A.).  

I’ve never experienced so much salty minerality so well integrated into the structure of a Sauvignon Blanc, well, of any white wine produced in Hungary. The wine shows outstanding harmony with very elegant, diamond-sharp acidity, elegant residual sugar (just a tiny bit) and extracts. The first sip was my best mouthful of wine for a long time and it was followed by similar ones for 90 minutes when we finished off the bottle with my wife. 

So back to the beginning, the wine had bright pale golden color with light brassy reflexions. The palate showed a very well balanced, fresh, but not too young character full of minerality and a lot of salt. Great texture, great body (not too heavy) and a lovely citrus element – all this integrated into a never-ending finish. 

Great palate with a wonderful balance and full of character. A very unique wine. Truly impressive from the vibrant entry to the endless finish. A must have item, even for Djungelvrål fans from Sweden or around the globe. I hereby announce it best buy champion since Dorombor this year (or maybe since forever). 

Score: 7

Price: HUF 1 920 / EUR 7,5 (a huge best buy)

I started the International Perspective blog entry category for orientation purposes and the most difficult thing about it is finding peer group members in the international space on reasonable ground. I have no strick rules so I thought I just would pick 2 wines (possibly of similar size on territory size parity, for Hungary being quite small) within a certain price range.

This time however I’ve chosen 2 well-known Wachau Riesling wines and tasted them against a relatively unknown Hungarian producer. To be fair, all vintages are widely considered good or outstanding.

I reviewed Szabo Zoltán’s Riesling 2006 recently. It was fresh, with intense floral and grassy nose with a hint of vanilla. On the palate citrus and peppermint, supported by robust, rustic acidity and intense aromas mostlyderiving from long lee contact. And stony minerality. The nose and the palate were in harmony in this full-bodied wine. It has wild but pleasant complexity. It also kept its quality for a day.

Few weeks later I noticed a smoky undertone, some woody accents and unripe apricot.

Score: 6+/7-

Jamek is one of the best-known Wachau winemakers. The Jamek Riesling Jochinger  2007 was brighter than Szabo’s riesling, with crab apple nose. On the palate greenish acidity supporting crab apple, grapefruit and minerality with herbal accents. Very refreshing, still round wine. The traubi-like bitterness provides pleasant freshness along with the young but already elegant acidity. The bouquet is later completed with paraffin.

It’s overall a young, fresh, dynamic wine which is pleasant to drink and has a local character.

Score: 5, 5+

I thought opening a Smaragd would be unfair. So I opened a Domane Wachau Riesling Smaragd Singerriedel 2005 inadvertently. But it turned out to be good because I only noticed my mistake after a few sips and to my biggest surprise I found the followings.

Medium gressy color with greenish reflections. Rich bouquet, intense, lovely floral and fruity nose (mango, citruses, walnut), very elegant, very pleasant to sniff.

Nicely styled on the palate but shows different character, less aromas. A bit woody and bitter with long acidity. Wet grass on the palate much later with minerality. The day after the grass element is even longer and more intense. Almost full body. Good wine but slightly disappointing for HUF 4 500 (EUR 18) against Szabó Zoltán’s HUF 1 500 (EUR 6). 

Score: 6, 6+

I was drawned to Chateau Megyer wines few weeks ago due to a meeting with its owner, Monsieur Jean Louis Laborde, a nice people by the way. It’s not that Chateau Megyer wines would be difficult to find, indeed, they’re everywhere. And that’s why I’ve been avoiding them and as you’ll see, maybe I should not have done so.

The review

Medium deep golden color. The nose is acacia, honey and caramel. Not quite what I expected. On the palate woody, even tanninic supported by unexpectedly buoyant acidity. The wine is full-bodied and not young, but neither too old. And it’s neither Chardonnay-esque. I suspect oak barrel aging maybe slightly over the top. As time passes, stewed apricot dominates the nose and on the palate along with minerality. Great combination, if you ask me. And it gets better with time.

The wine is full of surprises, considering the vintage. It’s round, intense and mineral. I suspect it was late harvested. 2-3 hours later, burnt sugar and flowers. It’s even too intense. The autumn leaf smell is much appreciated. This wine really made my day.

Score: 6, 6+

Price: HUF 1 410, EUR 5,5-6

As the winner of this month’s label beauty contest (awarded by me) and having been recommended by a wine shop clerk at Bortársaság (Ráday utca, if you wanna know, the best Bortársaság store in my opinion for the guy actually tasted apparently all the wines) this Furmint did create expectations, despite its modest price (I don’t want to upset anyone so I won’t say it’s cheap, but I might so).

The review

Rather deep golden color with some brownish reflections. Very intense bouquet, parched or very ripe apricot and mandarin, promising some sweetness and not too harsh acids. Already the bouquet indicates long contact with its lee, possibly battonage. The nose also includes other interesting odours, like lavender with herbal notes. On the palate it seems late harvest, it’s full, woody (but not tannic) and a great deal of bark and cinnamon.

The acids get a momentum first then they lay in the back, staying there for long but not too intensely. Later on the palate flan and roasted almond. Further on, marzipan. At higher temperature (which by the way this wine appreciates) alcohol. The wine does not leave fresh, young impression at all.

After one or two hours I sense more sweetness and more rocky minerality.

This wine alone would work well as an entire meal from starter to dessert. At this price, with the store’s discount, it’s a bargain too.

Score:6, 6+

Price: HUF 1650/ EUR 7 (retail list price)

Following my festival notes, I opened two bottles of Dorombor of Dereszla winery to make sure the hype is reasonable.

Dereszla and its French owners are hiding extremely well internet-wise and I’ve never visited them yet so all I can say is that they are currently producing wine from 27 hectares located on Henye, Dereszla, Zsadány, Pécsi, Hatalos, Várhegy, Lapis, Teleki, Napos, Becsek , Mestervölgy, Vinnai, Sajgó, Zafír and Király areas, which is already amazing.

About the wine.

The nose is incredibly refreshing and full of tropical fruits.

Round, only the sweetness is a little bit over the top just as I remembered. I would tolerate a bit more of its fresh, not too tart acidity. One of the recongisable tastes is Vilmoskörte (pear).

It’s an overall excellent wine, very lovable as the name suggests. For six euros, it’s also a best buy for (not only) everyday drinking.

Score: 6+/7-

Price: EUR 6

I’ve been preparing to write about this wine until many things I wanted to write are now out of date. But please continue reading, having in mind that these are my thoughts today (yesterday, actually).

I must admit that I’m relatively new to Tokaj wines. At the heights of my snobbery, drinking sweet wines was out of question. This only started changing 3 years ago under heavy influence of a local winemaker. Now I can only laugh at myself, how pathetic it was not being able to find the place of Tokaj wines in wine drinking. Anyway, my attention towards Tokaj started few years after Tokaj producers realised the potential in Furmint and Hárslevelű. Even today, only a handful of them are taking the dry Tokaji seriously. Most of them still think of it as a side-effect of variable climate: botritis-based noble rotting does not happen every year, at least not with the required intensity. And the result is either late harvest wines (which do not sell in large quantities – although it should, but this will be the subject of another post yet to come) or dry Furmint. Traditionally, these were mostly sold as bulk-wines but fortunately some quality winemakers started exploring the terroir in these wines. And the grapes appreciated their efforts, resulting in exceptional dry furmints in 2000 repeating it in almost every year. Of course, its quality still varied each year, so the better the conditions were, more Aszú were produced and less dry Furmint. In spite of this, you can still buy from the exceptional Oremus Mandolás Furmint 2003 and I celebrated this so much I bought several bottles from that year’s harvest.

I must admit I like Furmint a bit more than Hárslevelű, which tend to be more spicy.

The review

Now let’s get to the wine.

First of all, the nose is still at its best: very intense, a mixture of honey, cinnamon and lemon raspings. Beautiful, very dense. Unlike the more elegant Hétszőlő (Hétszőlő represents to me a whole other school of Furmint making), Mandolás is (although heavier on the nose and on the palate) more playful, sunny. Its maker’s objective was to impress you immediately when you sniff it. Good job, well done. Well balanced in on the nose, a whirlpool of sweetness and a bitter undertone. When you taste it, the whirlpool takes to the rocky bottom: it’s a mixture of minerals and pear, or rather quiche. Yes, because almond is also present with a mouth-filling sensation. Then suddenly, earlier than just a few months ago, its age takes over the taste and turns it into a tart, but still tasty, long finish. It recalls the memories of multi-colored fall leafs in its taste. And nice touch of mineral sensation remains.

This wine is now on sale with a discount, at around HUF 2 100 which still qualifies it for a best buy but only just, and not for long. So go and get one and drink it immediately.

Score: 6+ (it used to be a 7/7+ not so long ago)

Price: HUF 2 100 (EUR8)

I must admit I am not a regular festival visitor and I was surprised by the size of the Somló Tavasz festival: about a dozen twin kiosks, a hundred visitors and a huge tent describe well the scale of this event on the meadow on the outskirts of Somlóvásárhely. According to my winemaker friend, 40% of the visitors are regular festivalgoers who never miss one (hence the marketing value of the event is a bit questionable). All ages and all types of people were present: old ladies from the neighbouring villages sat in the tent quitely sipping their drinks while staring at the stage to check the appearance of a folklore dance group, there were families wandering around, kids riding horses, and some young folks trying to get a bit drunk. I really couldn’t spot any of the urban yuppies here who usually frequent these types of events. And no foreigners either.

It was charming and looked more like a big family reunion in a family where winemaking tradition’s got its roots from times when Juhfark was not yet recognised as a standalone grape.

Besides the local names (Györgykovács, Tornai, etc.) almost the same number of guest winemakers offered their wines, with few exceptions almost only from 2006 and 2005.

I really don’t think that festivals allow you to do some in-depth analysis of wine, it’s rather a quick scan of where are we standing and tasting unknown wines and trying to memorise those that you would like to try at home. So here are my notes, but since I did swallow all of these (at least in quantities of 1/2 dl) the objectivity is questionalbe. So I keep the order, I leave it to you what “filter” you apply to my judgement.

Maybe apart from Mátyás Szőke, there has not been any reason why I should have gone to Mátraalja up til now. I ran into a chilly bottle in my oncle’s kitchen and I liked the simplistic, but not “oh so trendy” minimalist bottle label of a so far to me unknown (but not unheared) winemaker called Tamás Szecskő.

This was the beginning of a long evening so I did not plan to pay too much attention to this wine (there were better known aces to follow). Maybe because of the cool temperature (below 10 celsius) its smell seemed very modest, lucking the suspicious sweetness and I don’t like the overly spicy white wines anyway. It has a very light, transparent color and probably without any scientific explanation that usually indicates crispyness to me. And it was. Very well balanced, easy to drink cuvée made from Zöldveltelini and Chardonnay (from 2005). A combination I’ve never seen before by the way. I so regret that I did not buy more Zöldveltelini (Grüner Veltliner) on my last purchasing trip to Wein und Co few weeks ago where there’s still an ongoing major sell-off of these. It’s an extremely easy to drink wine and that’s a bit dangerous because it’s 14,5% alcool. We so quickly finished 2 bottles of them and without having my notebook with me that I can hardly write anything more. I only now that I will have to buy it somewhere which probably won’t be easy because of Zwack’s exclusivity and it’s wide unavailability. I don’t even know how much could it cost, I found the Királyleányka (rumoured to be also very good) below EUR 6 which would qualify this wine for a best buy too.

Score: 6

Price: (guess) EUR 6

Note: the photos is an illustration taken of the