05 September 2024 / Ádám Geri
Cellars from Sopron to Tokaj are opening in September and October, the wine thieves and instruments are coming out, and wine producers and wine lovers are celebrating the harvest together. We have tried to select the most exciting events from the enticing events on offer, seeking out those that are unusual in some way or other. So we are recommending harvest-related sporting activities and restaurants cooking up a harvest menu, and will even tell you where to have fun among the vines without leaving Budapest.
Páty’s magical cellar hill hidden away in the forest (as well as other little-known cellar rows around Buda) was featured in a previous article. Of course, the cellar owners also fill this space with content from time to time. Their signature event connected to the harvest is the Autumn Wine Week, when for four days (Thursday to Sunday) at least one cellar will be hosting wine tastings and musicians. Consult the Páty Live Music Cellar Hill Wine Week (Pátyi Élőzenés Pincehegyi Borhét) Facebook event page to find out which ones and when.
People living around Bóly in Baranya County know that it’s not truly harvest without chicken paprikash. The speciality of the local recipe is its accompaniment, ‘spoon’ dumplings. This is one reason why it’s worth heading to the village, and of course because the whole cellar village of Bóly comes alive too… Not only the warm-hearted owners of the 400 cellars, but a concert and harvest ball will also ensure a lively atmosphere.
One of the most interesting harvest events is being held at the Hajos Cellar Village. Besides the usual cellar visit and wine tasting combo, you can also take part in a running race, a detective game, a pop-up wine course, and a buffalo spotting and herb walk in the Őrjeg and Vineyard Hills Nature Park. The organisers promise that those who wish to can even try their hand at crushing and pressing grapes.
The harvest is a big event in this small jewellery box of a village, 25 kilometres from Pécs and 7 kilometres from Villány. According to their own website, "the Harvest Open Cellars is one of the biggest and most colourful events of the autumn in Palkonya Gastro Village". Nine venues are officially taking part in the event, but you can be sure that almost all the cellar doors in the village will be proud and happy to invite you for a glass of wine (or must). And as it is a gastro village, the food on offer at the event in Palkonya will also be something pretty special. Zoltán Pauli's Palkonyha, Trifla Tasting House with its great truffles and the Vaj Bistro, which also uses local ingredients, will be among the open venues. If you are also seeking spiritual refreshment, you should register for the village tour to see the cultural and architectural heritage of the village.
Harvest is of course the highlight of Eger’s wine tourism chakra. As usual at this time, the wineries are organising wine tastings, and the organisers are putting together an enticing programme for families. A nice touch is that on the harvest weekend, four restaurants in Szépasszony Valley (Butykos Kisvendéglő, Édeskert Restaurant, Küvé Bistro and Wine Bar and Piknik Restaurant) will prepare special dishes containing grapes or wine.
If you want to go to a harvest festival, you don’t even have to leave Budapest. The former estate of Mór Jókai on Svábhegy (Swabian Hill) is now a nature reserve, and Buda's last secret vineyard is located here. Every year, the vines tended by volunteers produce the official wine of the city of Budapest, the centuries-old Buda Red. On 27 September, of course, there will be a harvest party here too. Between 3 and 6 pm, Swabian choirs and dance groups will perform in honour of the origins of Kadarka, the basis of Buda Red, and the former cultivators of Svábhegy. In exchange for a donation, you can also taste freshly pressed must, bread and lard and wine from the Jókai Garden, accompanied by a tango accordion musician.
The most anticipated event of the autumn season in the Balatonfüred-Csopak wine district. Participating wineries will welcome visitors with their already fermenting wines ("murcik"), but of course older wines will also be available for tasting. One interesting feature of the event is that wineries are not gathering together in one place, but each one is welcoming visitors to its own estate. You can visit Feind in Balatonfőkajár, Figula Winery, Zelna Winery and Gyukli Winery in Balatonfüred and Zsolt Söptei in Csopak.
Held almost every year since 1932, this is one of Hungary's oldest harvest festivals. This is a special year because Tokaj celebrated its 950th birthday (under this name) last year, and since then the town has virtually been in celebration mode. The motto of the 2024 event is (also) "White wines, colourful culture", so the festivities in the town centre will include wine, gastronomy, music, crafts and even an agricultural machinery demonstration. One of the unique events of the Tokaj Harvest Days is the grape combining ceremony. To demonstrate their solidarity, the mayors of each of the 27 municipalities in the wine region bring some of their own grapes to make the mayors' wine.
