Glassware

Two wines, one problem: the glass. A dry Furmint with razor-sharp acidity and an Aszú that can be as thick as honey demand, in effect, opposite things. No wonder the region long made do with borrowed glassware.

In 2015, the Austrian glassmaker Riedel developed a dedicated Furmint glass in response: an unusually wide bowl that narrows sharply toward the top. The wide bowl gives the acidity room to round out. The narrow opening concentrates the delicate, often floral aromas of Sárgamuskotály and Hárslevelű, which would otherwise simply escape upward in an ordinary white wine glass.

An Aszú, by contrast, calls for a much smaller glass, traditionally just a few centiliters, because such a concentrated wine is simply too much in large sips. It's served at ten to twelve degrees Celsius, cool enough not to feel cloying, yet warm enough for the aroma of apricot and honey to unfold.

Dry Furmint, on the other hand, tolerates more cold, eight to ten degrees Celsius, almost like a Riesling, and any warmer it loses exactly the acidity that lets it hold its own next to an Aszú, suddenly tasting flat.

As for quantity, the same principle applies to both styles as everywhere else: never fill to the brim. An Aszú is drunk in small sips anyway, often spoonful by spoonful like a dessert. That's exactly how it should be poured: generous in aroma, sparing in volume. Fill the glass to the brim, and you rob the aroma of the very space it needs to unfold.