Working out of Sopron in the very north-western corner of Hungary is one of the country’s leading artisanal winemakers, Peter Wetzer—a 5th generation winemaker crafting beautiful wines out of his 120+ year old cellar that is attached to his home. He is so passionate about Furmint and Kékfrankos, farming multiple sites of each across western Hungary that allow him to showcase the different and unique terroir they can express. In addition, he has painstakingly resurrected one of the only local Furmint vineyards and farms Olasrizling on an extinct volcano named Ság. His wines are thought-provoking and express a sense of place, all while being tremendously delicious.

Over the years, he has had to search high and low for healthy soils that haven’t been affected by all the industrial farming that took place during communism. The limited sites he was able to acquire are alive with flora and fauna, healthy cover crops and with exposures that only require maybe 1-2 sprays of sulphur, copper or nettle tea per year. Everything is done by hand in the vineyard, and all sites are picked and fermented separately. The grapes arrive into his cellar with extremely healthy yeast populations, allowing for fermentation to take place naturally. The wines are fermented in open topped containers before being barrelled down into old Hungarian oak barrels. His wines are neither fined nor filtered and bottled by gravity with minimal sulphur levels.

Peter Wetzer is considered by many as one of Hungary’s leading minimal intervention winemakers, a champion of native varietals and ancient techniques. His wines are so limited I had to wait a couple years to finally receive an allocation 🙌🏼 These wines are an exceptional example of what often underrepresented or inaccessible Hungarian wines can achieve.