How sweet it is to celebrate a covertly Sweet Saturday.

Are we going mad, or going TO MÁD, the home of Tokay’s most celebrated vineyards! Unlike this winery TRULY gone MAD with $40,000 magnums! Well, Tokay, as “the Wine of Kings and the King of Wines” can deserve every penny one could ask for. These are insane works of art, the original ‘noble rot’ wines of the world, a true labor of love like no other. Without a doubt, making Tokay is madness!

The production of Tokay is dependent on the beloved ‘noble rot’ called botrytis that only ‘works’ in certain ideal conditions rarely occurring in just a few corners of the globe. Hungarians called botrytized berries Aszú, carefully separated from the rest, collected in ‘Puttony’ baskets and added sparingly. Labels were based on how many Aszú baskets (up to 6 Puttonyos) were added to finished wines. Since the 2013 vintage, this basket measurement labeling was discontinued, though technically this wine is at the “6 Puttonyos” level.

Golden like the final rays of the sun as it sets to a balmy summer evening. An irresistibly exotic perfume with peach, apricot, and candied hazelnuts captivates with the first whiff. Sweet, lush and generous at first sip while concentrated, refined and structured too as it blooms on the palate. Seamless, honeyed and floral, it lingers effortlessly on the ethereal finish, seemingly to eternity. This will pair flawlessly with a broad range of gourmet specialties like itself, from foie gras to stilton, from dried fruits and nuts to cardamom poached pears, or even a traditional kunefe.

It can take up to 100 pounds of grapes to make a half bottle of Tokay. In comparison, to make the average bottle of wine 2-3 pounds of grapes suffice. So why on earth would anyone who has their head on straight make a Tokay? Tradition, and taste. Being blessed with an ideal niche climate to BE ABLE TO make a wine like this leads to centuries of continuity because no other sweet elixir tastes as good as these otherworldly nectars. Finding one of these, alone, is ample reason to celebrate while finding one at half price is reason to drop everything on your plate and stash all you can.

Here’s what the wine press has to say:

Double Gold - New York International Wine Competition - *At this competition Szent Tamás also won the prestigious Winery of the Year award.