Harvest Notes 2026
We have kicked of our 2026 harvest season a little early this year, starting with picking our beloved Sauvignon Blanc first. Everyone in the team is working hard to bring in the lovely berries, and the cellar is already filling up with juices bubbling away. Read Robert's notes on one of our driest, but very promising harvest below.
Hot / Dry
The season was hot and dry, but this is no news to anyone who was in Europe during the summer months. At Szent György-hegy, we had roughly two months of extreme drought and relentless high temperatures, leaving our vines visibly stressed. Dry leaves scattered through the rows, an unusual sight even for those of us who've worked through tough vintages before.
The dry conditions shrank some of the berries, some blocks and vineyards held up better than others. What surprised us the most was the juice concentration: despite the stress, the fruit preserved good acidity, and alcohol, especially on the Váradi vineyard, an important plot for our top cuvées.
The heat pushed us to start harvest early (our testing and sampling had shown sugar levels climbing and the berries looking ready to ripen) with Sauvignon Blanc, followed by Olaszrizling.
A lovely guest
It is always amazing to have extra helping hands in the vines and the cellar. A pleasant addition to our 2026 harvesting crew was Samm Hevitt, the voice behind Shattered Wines joined us from the Hudson Valley in New York, and brightened up our early harvest days. She came with her own background in both cider and vineyard work, curious to see more of how we do things here. It seems that she liked what she saw, and it was exciting to show her the region and our little mountain.
Up next.. Furmint!
Of course, we are still not done picking grapes... so we keep going, turning our attention to Furmint, which has handled the heat notably well (as it tends to, in general). Berry size varied a lot within the vineyards, from big, juicy berries to tighter, drier ones, but the fruit we brought in so far looked good overall. We're picking in small, focused passes each day rather than rushing the whole block at once.
Luckily, we had a "cold moment" and the weather hasn't been pressing us so much in the last days. We did get one welcome bit of rain last week (around 15 to 16 millimeters), which helped tremendously, especially in the vineyards facing south. The weather is looking dry but not so hot at the moment, which gives us a little room to breathe: time to think through harvest dates, decide what to pick next, and how to continue the cellar works in the coming days, rather than working under pressure. That's really our goal, not to be overly pressured and to plan, think, and work without unnecessary stress.