Tokaji Aszú Dessert Wines

Series Summary

When dining in Budapest, Grundel's traditional Hungarian cuisine is not to be missed. And after you sample some of the dishes which draw discriminating pallets from around the world, you'll certainly want to try their famous palacsinta dessert, a pancake with a filling made from rum, raisins and walnuts, and covered with chocolate sauce. What better to accompany this unique delectable than a glass of Tokaji Aszú, the Hungarian dessert wine which is actually named in the Hungarian national anthem.

In this free online video guide to dessert wines, Gundel's sommelier Mihály Fabók offers tips and advice on how to pick the right wine to accompany dessert. He describes the characteristics of port, Sauternes, and of course, Tokaji Aszú dessert wines. He shows you how to open and test the wine, and suggests when you should serve dessert wine during a meal. Anyone can order the right wine for a steak. Only a true wine aficionado can follow it up by matching the perfect dessert with the perfect dessert wine.

Video Transcript

"Hello, my name is Mihaly Fabok and we are here in behalf of Expert Village. Now we are talking about dessert wines. We know so many different types of dessert wines from different countries. For example, we have a very famous dessert wine from Hungary called Tokaji and this is one of the most important products Hungary has given the world. This is the Tokaji Aszu. We have two type of Tokakske. This one is a bit younger and this is a five putnovy. This is a basic indicator on the label for the concentration of the wine and also the level of the sweetness. And we have a little bit older one called Aszu Eszcencia which is one of the most sweetest Tokaji Aszu. And, you can see the color, it's a nice brownish color. The vintage year was 1964 and the previous one was much younger. The vintage year is 2000 so you can see the color. It has a nice golden yellow color and this one has a nice deep brownish color. So for example, if you have a nice pancake called a Gunda pancake which is a famous dessert at the restaurant of Gunda I can recommend for you a very nice Aszu Esczencia. This pancake is stuffed with walnut grain and some chocolate sauce on it and some apricot on the side. So it's much involved with this old very concentrated sweet dessert wine called Tokaji Aszu Asczencia which has also a similar flavor like a dried apricot, fig, walnut cream liquor. And it has also a nice acidity which keeps balance. So it much involved with this famous Hungarian dessert. This one that I mentioned is a little bit younger. It is only seven years old, Tokakske and this one is less sweet than the Aszu Asczencia. So the number, which is a basic indicator on the label can be three, four, five or six, so this is a five putnovy. It's quite sweet. It has more than 12% of residue and sugar in the wine and of course this wine is made from the overripe Sribod and the Botryticide nobel rot grapes. So the wine became very sweet, very flavorful and also it has a fresh acidity. This one is made from a local grape variety in the Tokaji Region called Furmint Harslevelu and Muscat. So this is a famous dessert wine but can also be a good choice with blue cheese or if you have a three putnovy four putnovy Aszu or a late harvest, not too sweet Tokaji wine it is also much involved with the goose liver to start your dinner for example."