FIRST JOURNEYS - EASTERN EUROPEAN EXPEDITION- PIN 11 OF 17

A ROAD TRIP WHERE EVERY STOP HAS A STORY

Welcome to Tokaj, a land of giants, Titans, fairies, witches and river spirits, where even the landscape comes with its own mythology.


Local legends tell of giants battling to create Tokaj Hill, fairies inhabiting its rocks and shepherds turned to stone before being rescued by those same fairies. There are stories of witches gathering on the hilltop, mysterious spirits haunting the marshes and Tisza fairies living along the river.


It sounds like the setting for a rather good fantasy novel, yet these stories are woven into the folklore of one of Hungary's most famous wine regions.


Tokaj sits in north-eastern Hungary, where the Bodrog and Tisza rivers meet, surrounded by hills and vineyards. The region's wine heritage stretches back centuries and is so important to its identity that the Tokaj Wine Region Historic Cultural Landscape was recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2002. The landscape, climate, volcanic soils and centuries of winemaking traditions all combine to give Tokaj a very particular sense of place.


Its most famous creation is Tokaji Aszú, the intensely sweet wine made from grapes affected by botrytis, or noble rot. There is a wonderfully dramatic legend attached to its origins. During the 17th century, fears of an Ottoman attack supposedly delayed the grape harvest. When the growers eventually returned to the vineyards, the grapes had shrivelled and developed noble rot. Rather than abandon them, they picked the strange-looking fruit and made wine from it.


The story usually credits Máté Szepsi Laczkó with creating the first Tokaji Aszú, traditionally dated to around 1630. The romantic version makes a great story, although history has muddied the waters: documentary evidence records aszú wine as early as 1571, decades before Szepsi Laczkó's supposed creation. He may well have played an important part in its history, but he almost certainly wasn't the first person ever to make it.


Centuries later, another spirit producer in Tokaj would take a very different approach to the region's raw materials.


That gin comes from Seven Hills Distillery, founded by Dénes Mészáros-Komáromy. His route into distilling wasn't the traditional one either.

He was working as a manager in the audiovisual industry while developing his knowledge of spirits and distilling in his spare time. The idea of creating a Hungarian gin came from seeing an opportunity rather than following an established national tradition.



Seven Hills opened in Bodrogkisfalud, in the heart of the Tokaj region, and its Tokaj Gin was designed to make the connection with the area meaningful rather than simply putting a famous wine-region name on a bottle.


There are 21 botanicals in the recipe, with many sourced from local farmers and suppliers, where possible. Alongside juniper you'll find ingredients including coriander, cubeb, blackcurrant, pink grapefruit, pine buds and sea buckthorn. More importantly for the Tokaj connection, the recipe includes Hárslevelű grapes, a traditional local grape variety, along with elderflower and other ingredients gathered or sourced from the surrounding area.


Rather than simply adding grapes to the botanical basket, Seven Hills ferments and distils the grapes separately, then incorporates that distillate into the gin. Elderflower receives similar treatment. Fermentation is unusual in gin production, making this one of the details that sets Tokaj Gin apart.


The distillery uses an iStill, allowing different techniques to be combined during a single distillation. Some botanicals are macerated in the spirit for around 24 hours, others are introduced later, while fresh ingredients can be placed into a vapour basket. It sounds rather high-tech, yet the reason for doing it is straightforward: different ingredients release their best flavours in different ways.


Tokaj Gin won Master at The Gin Masters in 2020, followed by World's Best Contemporary Style Gin at the World Gin Awards in 2021, with further recognition from The Gin Guide in 2022.


Tokaj's story is woven into the gin through its grape variety, local botanicals, forest ingredients and unusual use of fermentation. After centuries of making wine from this landscape, Seven Hills has found another way to put Tokaj in a glass.

"From giants, fairies and noble rot to Hungarian gin"


Atlas note:

If you find yourself in Tokaj, Seven Hills Distillery is open to visitors by appointment, with tours lasting around 1½ hours. The tour gets properly hands-on, introducing the distillery, its technology and botanicals, with a little guessing game to see if you can identify the ingredients before tasting Tokaj Gin neat and in a long drink. There is also SEVEN Cocktail Bar in Budapest's VII district, giving the gin a second home with G&Ts, signature cocktails and a much wider drinks list.













"Show me a bottle

and I'll tell you a story."