23 February 2022 / Edit Szabó
Have you been a wine drinker all your life?
I wouldn’t say that exactly! Like most young people of my generation, I was raised on wine and cola at college. My older brother Csabi (Csaba Sebestyén, winemaker – ed) was the one who became more interested in quality wines, and I liked that too. We started a small club with young winemakers from Szekszárd and tasted wines from famous wineries like Vega Sicilia. This was a big thing at the time, but we were actually stumbling around in the dark, because we didn’t know what good meant. However, we got even more interested and began to visit wineries not only in Hungary but also abroad.
Didn’t you want to be a winemaker?
I didn’t think I had the talent for it and was more excited by tasting. And then Csabi decided pretty quickly that he was going to be a winemaker, and clearly you don’t need two in one family. I graduated with a degree in economics in 2003, the same year my parents and we started our family winery. As I had specialised in tourism, it was only natural that I should be responsible for hospitality and marketing.
You could have stuck with that. What made you decide to continue studying? What attracted you to become a sommelier?
I met a few people who were very good tasters and had a wonderful way of talking about wines. Péter Vida is my eternal example, I could have listed to him until morning, he talked so beautifully, even though I often didn’t understand what he was saying. Then I realised that it is a profession, and it’s something you can learn. I was working in a wine shop, where I had to present the wines at the thematic tastings I organised, and I also did a sommelier training course in Pécs run by a Bordeaux university. It was then that I realised how huge the wine world is, and if I wanted to understand what was going on around me, I would need to go out and see the world.
Csilla and Csaba Sebestyén, Sebestyén Garage Winery (Photo: Kornél Makovics)
Where did you head?
I went to Scotland, where I ended up spending six years. The first year I worked as a commis sommelier in a restaurant with a wine list of 550 wines. Just imagine. I slowly worked my way up the ranks, and after three years, I continued as a sommelier and then head sommelier at Andrew Fairlie’s two-star Michelin restaurant. In the meantime, I completed my WSET diploma, writing my final thesis on Bikavér.
Did you achieve any particular professional successes while abroad?
There is an international competition for restaurant wine lists. The place I was working had received every possible recognition, but its wine list had never received an award, although my boss had always wanted this. Before I came home, our wine list was one of the best in the world. It was a great feeling to be able to say that my work had not been in vain.
Didn’t you want to continue your adventure and try your luck in London or New York…?
I lived in London for a while, but the big city is not for me. I like the peace and quiet, being surrounded by nature, going out into the hills. So, I came home in 2014. I kept my international contacts though and have been going back regularly ever since. What happened when you came home? I continued working in the family winery. Csabi and I defined the style of the wines and the concept together. In the cellar, I play an important role in the blending of the wines, but otherwise I’m in charge of exports, marketing, the website, new labels, catering and our presence abroad – I do a lot of tastings.
Vineyards in the Szekszárd wine district
What new insight did you gain after those six years?
While I was working in restaurants, tasting 40-50 wines a day, the way I now think was slowly crystallising. I am convinced that Bikavér should be one of the most important wines for Szekszárd. Csabi and I fought a lot. I always said that our wines had too much alcohol, too much oak and too much body. Of course, my brother wasn’t very happy about the criticism, but when he came to visit me, or when we went to different wine regions together and tasted, he understood a lot. If you have ever been to Burgundy or Piedmont, you know that the reason a wine is good is not because it is full bodied. When we blend, we are now also aiming for richness of flavour and elegance, something we learnt from those foreign wines.
You didn’t want to keep this knowledge to yourself. As soon as you returned home, you reported on your experiences to the Szekszárd winemakers. How was this received?
It got a mixed reception, but 18 winemakers came together for a serious discussion, and we expressed our desire to put Szekszárd on the world wine map. So that people recognise it in the same way they know Rioja or Tuscany, and they know that it is a Hungarian wine region, where mainly local varieties are used to make the wine. If this message gets through, then we have been successful. That’s why we came up with the idea of the Szekszárd bottle, because the wines that end up in it are in line with international trends and are well-suited for promoting the wine region’s reputation around the world.
The most striking detail of the uniform Szekszárd bottle
Which local varieties do you focus on?
In the case of blends, Szekszárdi Bikavér, with Kadarka and Kékfrankos for varietal wines. It is important to become an easily identifiable wine region, where varietal characters are clear and the blends are lovely, because Szekszárd is primarily about blends.
How can you work together towards a common goal? Who do you get advice and guidance from?
We organise joint events, tastings and gatherings, which help the Hungarian public discover the Szekszárd bottle and the wines it contains. We also invite Hungarian sommeliers once a year, when we always have an internationally recognised Master Sommelier or Master of Wine with us, whose opinion we all value.
Recently, for example, the renowned Master Sommelier Eric Zwiebel was here. Did you get any useful advice from him?
Yes, including the need to focus on local varieties. But the most important thing for me is what he said about Bikavér. It struck him that we always say that this is no longer the Bikavér we made in the years of socialism, and he said it’s as if the Austrians show their wines today, saying, “Don’t worry, this was made after the glycol scandal.” There’s no need to brainwash people about the wines’ negative past! We need to show that these are excellent, wonderful wines, which can hold their own in the market by international standards.
Csilla Sebestyén and Eric Zwiebel (Photo: Kornél Makovics)
It’s true that the pandemic that started two years ago has significantly reduced everyone’s options, but what’s the current situation with the Szekszárd bottle cooperation? What are the results so far?
We try to organise events and training. I teach the basics of wine tasting every week, I go to a college every week so that people can taste wine, so that anyone one who’s interested can have this experience. Anyway, I’ve seen that there has been an increased interest in our wines during the pandemic, with the Vida Estate, Tüske Winery, Márkvárt Winery and the Heimann Family Winery reporting a welcome increase in exports to the US and the UK.
What are foreign wine merchants looking for?
Definitely the curiosities, the local varieties, but it’s a tiered market, and we don’t target the hypermarkets with our wines, rather wine merchants and the hospitality sector. For example, a restaurant chain paired our Kadarka with one of the dishes on their menu and served it to all their guests for six weeks. I think this is a very good result, just as it is important that writers at Decanter magazine give 95 points to a Hárslevelű or a Kadarka, that Caroline Gilby often writes lovely things about Hungarian wines, or that Jancis Robinson mentions our Kadarka and our Bikavér among her favourite wines of 2021. The work that Zsuzsa Toronyi and Wines of Hungary UK do is also very important, as the British market discover a lot of Hungarian wines through their events.
Sommelier meeting in the Szekszárd wine district (Photo: Kornél Makovics)
And how are things at the Sebestyén Winery at the moment?
Our exports to the US and the UK have also increased, from 17% to 25%, which of course we are very happy about. We have been consciously building things up for ten years now, and the primary criterion when buying new vineyard areas was that they should be the most suitable for the varieties that constitute Bikavér, because we want to show the wine region’s terroir through three single-vineyard Bikavérs. Three prominent but distinctly different areas in the Iván-völgy, Porkoláb-völgy and Görögszó vineyards play a key role in this. It will be exciting to see what wines they produce each year. Continuous learning is essential. Let’s be honest, we have 30-40 vintages ahead of us, and it will be good if 10-15 of those are ageworthy. We don’t have much time.
You are doing very responsible and serious work, which never ends, as one task just leads to another. You don’t look tired. Are you enjoying it?
Very much so. Our whole family has sacrificed a lot to make sure the Sebestyén Winery makes good wines, but we have never been strangers to work. During the harvest, when the wines are already fermenting, my father often goes down to the cellar, even at night, and Csabi joins him at 4 am, even if he only got home at midnight. My partner also goes, when time allows, and I try to give it my all too. I’m where I want to be, among people I love, and fortunately, we’re getting some good results, even though we’re still at the beginning of the journey.
What are you most looking forward to now the pandemic has receded?
I hope that the people who discovered Hungarian wines during the pandemic will come here and see the country and its wine regions for themselves. Wine is a product of trust, and customers will be convinced when they see what serious work is being done. Imagine how fantastic it would be if these open-minded wine tourists interested in quality wine poured into the country, left with good experiences and returned again and again!
Featured picture: Kornél Makovics
