Babka's 90th
Trip Start
Mar 21, 2008
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3
Trip End
Mar 30, 2008
Kuzmice,
Slovakia
Sunday, March 30, 2008
In preparation for Babka (Andrea's Grandmother) big 90th celebration we wanted to source some wine from the Tokay region which is not too far away from Babka's village of Kusmice. The region itself straddles both Slovakia and Hungary, although generally the Hungarian versions are more widely known (perhaps due to more intensive marketing?).
Tokay barrels
The wine is a very sweet dessert style wine, and gets it's sweet taste and syrupy texture from the addition of botrytised grapes (sort of molded but still good grapes picked at the end of season). The amount added then defines the rating of putňový (or stars) from the least (3) to the most (6). Our favourite was the 5 putňový, as it had the right mix of sweetness and taste to it.We were fortunate enough to be able to get guided tour of one of the local wine cellars thanks to a neighbour who had previously worked there. The tour was fascinating as we were lead around musty caves deep underground and got to sample a few of the wines at the end. Check out the website below if you want to know more.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokaj_(Slovakia)
http://www.galafruit.sk
Family shot 2
For Babka's 90th, we had pretty much the whole village over and Andrea's Aunties, plus as a surprise both of Andrea's parents came over as well. A great night was had by all, and not much alcohol left at the end of it, especially the bottles of "American Eagle" vodka, which were probably bottled over 20 years ago ...
