Hungary for new wine? Search out the Furmint

You may or may not be familiar with the grape variety Furmint — although you’ve probably tried it in some form without even knowing it… But now’s the time to properly search it out.

After having spent 7 years working in the wine trade in Eastern Europe, I have developed a taste for many of the wines made with native grapes from this part of the world and I’ve got to know Furmint, a native Hungarian variety with it’s roots and heritage firmly intrenched in the soils of the Tokaj-Hegyalja region in the north east of the country.

It’s the predominant grape variety in production of Tokaji wines, which come in the forms of very dry, and very sweet - the sweet dessert wines are the ones best known to most people in Western Europe. Wines most drunk rather rarely, because the moment or the occasion doesn’t present itself.

Here though I am focusing on the fantastic dry wines made from Furmint, the sort of wines I like to drink regularly, although other neighbouring countries in the this region plant Furmint, often under a local name given to the variety. There are plantations in Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia and Romania, and all making very good wines of varying styles, including some excellent sparkling wines.

So that’s background on the grape, but what’s in the glass?

The Tornai Furmint 2013.
The Tornai vineyard is a 4th generation family owned vineyard, which celebrated its 70 anniversary last year, and focuses on local and native grape varieties.

Located in the north west of the country in the region of Veszprém on the slopes of Mount Somló, where the soils are volcanic, giving a unique character to the wines produced there. This is the smallest wine region of Hungary, producing only white wine.

Buying Hungarian wine, wherever you can find it in the UK market, is tricky. For one thing, unless you are a native Hungarian speaker the labelling can be off putting — words which take many out of their comfort zone, with grape varieties like, Zenit, Hárslevelú, and Szürkebarát.

At least, however, this does make Furmint a much more approachable grape in that respect at least, and with Tornai Furmint the labelling is as easy to read, as the wine is to drink, stating only the vineyard name, grape, and year on the bottle. So far so good, we’ve made it to first base…

As I write, I’m sipping a glass with a plate of green olives, and its going down rather well. It has a vestry lean citrus quality about it, minerallity and grapeyness. I don’t like to drink it too chilled either, around about 14 degrees allows the favours to express themselves. This wine could be drunk as an aperitif, and would also sit very nicely on the the table with fish or white meats.

To find wine these wines in the UK market can require some effort though, but it’s definitely worth it, so keep searching. You may have more luck finding them in the smaller independent wine retailers, but do ask around as more are starting to find their way into the UK market, as is the case with a number of wines from Eastern Europe.

The interested wine buyer is crying out for something new, and the Eastern European wines can fill that gap.

People’s perceptions are also changing for the better, and with the vast improvements in this region over the last 15 years, the future is bright. With large investment (much of it EU funds) in technology and know how, combined with some of the best wine growing conditions nature can offer, I think we all have something to look forward to, there’s some good drinking ahead!