SOPORIFIC IN SOPRON

(79 wines tasted as of the end of this post)

I left Gyor at about 11 am for a two hour bus ride to Sopron.  The city sits in the northwest corner of Hungary and is only about an hour from either Vienna, Austria or Bratislava, Slovakia.  It makes an interesting prospect for a day trip to each city or even spending a night or two in each of them.

I took a taxi from the bus station and arrived at the Ringhofer Guesthaus.  A young lad showed me to my room: think a small French garret (top floor with slanted ceilings and two skylights), and when I asked him whom to pay, he replied ‘grandma’.   Grandma turned out to be a gentle, good natured, a gray-haired woman of many years.  I think anyone would be proud to have her as a grandma.

I paid for my room and was immediately off to catch the last afternoon of the three days of the Sopron Festival.  The part of the festival that interested me was the wine tasting offered by some twenty odd regional wineries.  When I got to the tasting area, however, I discovered that many of the small, temporarily erected wooden structures were closed. 

Only about ten were open.  I bought a sauvignon blanc from one winery.  I was asked if I had a wine glass; I said no, and the wine was poured into a plastic picnic cup.  The 2015 vintage was nice, light and fruity.  I drank and walked until I came to another winery’s booth.

 There I bought two red wines: a Cabernet Sauvignon 2011 with a cherry sweet bouquet and a taste going quickly to minerality and dry. That was followed by Soproni Ejszka.  What a lovely wine. Not much bouquet; however the wine’s flavors take time to unfold in the mouth.  A profusion of slightly under ripe fruit.  The booth’s proprietor and I talked about wine, and he proceeded to pour three more wines, one after the other, for me to taste.  I’d say about a half deciliter of each.

First: Iraqi Oliver 2015.   Wonderful nose of linden flower.  Delightfully clean and fresh on the palate.  Then a Rose zweigelt (Siraz) with 2 grams of sugar.  That was followed by a dry merlot rose which had a light taste and a semi dry finish.

By now my head had a buzz, so I went in search of something to eat since I had not eaten anything at all that day.  I came upon a patisserie nearby and chose a slice of cake.

The large slice of dessert helped tame some of the alcohol roaming around in my stomach.  By now it was late afternoon, and I headed back to the wine tasting area.  It turned out that many of the wine producers had taken midday off and were reopening their huts.  I went to one where the guy told me he could only sell me wine if I had an official festival wine glass.  He pointed to one of the huts, and off I went. 700 forint later, with an official wineglass in hand, I returned to his booth.

After I purchase and drink another couple of deciliters of wines, I find out belatedly that the glass I am now in possession of is a magic portal.  By my rough calculation, there are well over 100 wines available that afternoon.

I am already half in the bag but feel I cannot resist the opportunity to taste some more wines.  So I launch, or perhaps I should say lurch, onward on my tasting expedition.  A couple of hours or so later, after drinking or tasting some 24 wines, I quit the field of battle and go in search of a substantial meal to soak up the alcohol.  That sounds like a large number of wines, but the total consumed was somewhat less than two bottles, give or take.

Just before I leave, it is hoot to find that I can sell my 700 forint glass back for 500 forint.  So for 200 forint, or 72 cents, I could have tasted every wine at the festival!  Live and learn.

On the way back to my guesthaus, I find a restaurant that turns out to have garnered the TripAdvisor 2014 award as the top restaurant in Sopron.  Take a look at the entrée which arrived in an enormous wooden ‘boat’.  And this was after I had eaten a delicious appetizer of ground meat wrapped in a delicate pancake drenched with a tasty sauce.

(I later found out that the restaurant - Erhardt was the number one rated restaurant in Sopron by TripAdvisor)

No wine with dinner, thank you.

For those of you interested in the gory details of my tastings,  you can see them below, other than the ones I mentioned above.  Alas, some are missing completely.  Others became abbreviated as I became inebriated.

Kekfrankos 2014

12.5 % alcohol

No nose

Dry 

Blue Frankish

Harsh tannic

Not enjoyable

Like a lot of Argentine wines made to drink with an assado to cut the rich grease

Pinot blanc

Dry white wine

Slightly acid 

Slightly mineral nose reminiscent of a French grave

Zoldveltelini 2015

Light floral

Harsh new grape!!

Zenit 2014

Bonis Peter winery 

Zowie what a bouquet

Beautiful taste as well

Fidelissima 2006

(oops, forgot to write)

Irshai Oliver 2015

Outstanding bouquet and fresh flower taste

Korai piros velteluni 2015

Light floral with dry finish

Kekfrankos rose

?????

Kekfrankos 2015

Classic

Alcohol new wine

Dry tannic acidic

Chardonnay 2010

Traditional method 

Blanc de blanc

Unique flavor reminds me of a Montrachet I tasted years ago in France with green apple and a little fizz on the lips

Traminer 2015

White fragrant bouquet

Fresh raw wine

Zenit 2013

Delicious bouquet

Floral sweet overtones

Taste: you get the flavor of the grape, then acid dry, and then the flavor of the grape returns

Kekfrankos 2015 rose

Very assertive rose

5 grams of residual sugar

Concealer 

Zweigelt 2014

Grape nose

Dry, tannic

Kekfrankos 2013

Nice kekfrankos nose

Delicious dry, tannic 

Looking back at the entries above, I think it is the first time I ever used ‘zowie’ as a descriptive term for tasting a wine.  Then again, it is a first to have consumed so much alcohol in several hours (well, other than college.

(nb.  Above blog professionally edited by none other than MBSF)