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One of the most devastating occurrences in winemaking is a lost vintage, often caused by unfavorable weather conditions before the grapes can reach full maturity. This issue arose several times since 2009, the last instance prior to now when Royal Tokaji could manufacture its exceptionally rare Essencia. In the six vintages from 2009 and 2016 (including the latest release), ideal conditions for azsú berries were not met five times, with the year 2013 presenting the most significant disappointment.

According to Royal Tokaji’s managing director Charlie Mount, most producers in the region concur that 2013 ranks among the finest vintages in Tokaji history. “We had perfect conditions for azsú, and we had amazing quantity as well,” shares Mount with Robb Report. “Essencia was being produced in abundance, but, we couldn’t find anything that we thought was worth bottling after five or six years in our cellar. This resulted in one of the most painful decisions we’ve ever made, failing to meet our standards despite having a huge quantity of Essencia and deciding not to release the 2013 vintage.”

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Although neither 2014 nor 2015 provided ideal conditions for enough quality azsú berries to produce Essencia, the summer and fall of 2016 offered perfect circumstances to capture the precious free-run juice (more on that later) that goes into making this prized elixir. And prized it should be. Only the eighth vintage of Essencia released in the winery’s 34-year history, sipping Royal Tokaji 2016 Essencia from specially designed crystal spoons that reveals its deep amber hue and aromas of dried apricot, ripe summer peach, and honeycomb. It rolls over the tongue like syrup with nimble viscosity and a sumptuous vein of acidity that keeps its inherent sweetness from overpowering its flavors of apricot nectar, peach pie, candied orange peel, and fresh honey that leaves a trail of tangerine zest in their wake.

Meaning “dry” in Hungarian, azsú berries are grapes that have been afflicted with Botrytis cinerea, the grey mold called Noble Rot that is responsible for the creation of Tokaji Azsú as well as Sauternes and Spätlese and Beerenauslese Riesling. Unlike common household molds, Botrytis requires an optimal setting to do its work; if it is present in a season that is relentlessly wet, it will ruin the grapes it’s growing on, making them useless for winemaking. But a period of humidity, especially one with cool, foggy mornings, that precedes a dry period just before harvest creates an ideal situation. The fungus dehydrates the grapes, which increases the proportion of fruit sugars and acids, offering a sweeter, more intensely flavored berry from which to make wine. Affected grapes shrivel to the point that they look like raisins.

In the traditional production of azsú wines, botrytized grapes are gathered in large carriers known as puttony and mixed into 136-liter barrels of base wine. The quantity of sweet grapes integrated with the base wine gives the Tokaji Aszu the unique Puttonyos marking of either five or six Puttonyos. To be labeled as five Puttonyos, a Tokaji Aszu wine must contain at least 120 grams per liter of residual sugar, while a six Puttonyos wine should have at least 150 grams per liter. Essencia wines, on the other hand, can have sugar content between 450 and 600 grams, requiring high acidity to balance the sugar levels; for instance, Royal Tokaji’s 2016 vintage has 534.6 g/l of sugar.

While Tokaji Azsú has long been adored by nobility, artists, and poets, Tokaji Essencia is in a class of its own. It’s not just Louis XIV who hailed Tokaji as “The King of wines, the wine of Kings.” Esteemed British wine author and founder of Royal Tokaji in 1990, Hugh Johnson OBE, amusingly refers to its Essencia as “medieval Viagra.” Each 375-milliliter bottle of Essencia contains the juice extracted from 88 pounds of dried berries, which is approximately 50,000 grapes. This is a stark contrast to the average 750 ml bottle of dry wine, which uses about 2.5 pounds or approximately 200 grapes. The meticulous production process involves selecting the finest botrytized grapes from top-rated plots. As Chris Mount, a wine expert, states, “It’s a question of waiting.”

Post harvest, the shriveled Furmint, Harslevelu, and Muscat Blanc grapes, that have lost about 80 percent of their moisture, are laid on racks to let the juice drip. As Mount explains, “We don’t press them or apply any pressure so a tiny amount of liquid drips through a grating at the bottom of the collecting vat. We draw it off from time to time, we keep every grape variety and every site separate, and we do an initial selection.” The juice absorbs moisture from the high humidity wine cellar; naturally occurring yeast from the cellar settles on the surface and a spontaneous fermentation takes place from the top down. About 70 percent of that free-run juice is transferred into glass demi-johns of varying sizes, from 10 to 50 liters, depending on the plots. The entire process takes at least five to seven years. “All along we’re waiting and tasting and towards the end we’ll make a final selection of the batches to be blended and bottled as Essencia,” Mount continues.

Though a wine bottle accompanied by a crystal spoon might appear gimmicky, the high viscosity of the wine actually makes it more practical to sip it with a spoon than from a glass. This is largely because about 15 percent of the initial juice sticks to the grates, and nearly 30 percent more is discarded before blending. Only 2,300 bottles of this prized liquid, priced at $1,416 each, were produced. Each bottle contains roughly 25 tablespoons, and every drop is treasured. If you desire to sample it but can’t get a full bottle, select restaurants like Oiji Mi and Gabriel Kreuther in New York City offer bottles and crystal spoons for your sweet sipping delight.

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