Blaü-Ökör Austro-Hungarian

“Kek Bika” on my back label rather than the “Blaü-Ökör” here and on Vinous Obscura’s website, this mystery red nevertheless matches the descriptions in every other respect. It’s strong evidence supporting a thesis I have yet to sell on the wine makers in my family: the tyranny of the French clones is overrated; nature’s mutations are an abundance to be harvested instead of flaws to be weeded out; and the wine market is due for the same sort of revolution that hit eating apples a decade or so ago. This wine is light, acidic, and yet fresh and fruit forward, bringing to mind raspberries, sour cherries, English hedgerow fruits (like gooseberries or elderberries or something that I, being only an occasional visitor, can’t put my finger on) but without being cloying. It finishes with a peppery kick that rivals the best Syrahs. I still have a long way to go to sell my grand thesis, but my skeptical Francophile wife is at least sold on this particular wine.