Royal Tokaji Essencia (375ML half-bottle with Lacquer Box and Crystal Spoon) 2008

  • 97 Robert
    Parker
Sold Out - was $899.99
OFFER Take $20 off your order of $100+
Ships Thu, Apr 4
You purchased the 2021 7/30/23
0
Limit Reached
You purchased the 2021 7/30/23
Alert me about new vintages and availability
Royal Tokaji Essencia (375ML half-bottle with Lacquer Box and Crystal Spoon) 2008  Gift Product Image
Royal Tokaji Essencia (375ML half-bottle with Lacquer Box and Crystal Spoon) 2008  Gift Product Image Royal Tokaji Essencia (375ML half-bottle with Lacquer Box and Crystal Spoon) 2008  Gift Product Image Royal Tokaji Essencia (375ML half-bottle with Lacquer Box and Crystal Spoon) 2008  Gift Product Image Royal Tokaji Essencia (375ML half-bottle with Lacquer Box and Crystal Spoon) 2008  Front Label

Product Details


Varietal

Region

Producer

Vintage
2008

Size
375ML

ABV
4%

Features
Collectible

Your Rating

0.0 Not For Me NaN/NaN/N

Somm Note

Winemaker Notes

Deep gold color with a hint of amber. Fresh, ripe peach on the nose with complex honeyed, spicy, ginger notes and background presence of botrytis. Full but graceful to taste, intensely concentrated, rich and sweet, balanced with taunt acidity.

Professional Ratings

  • 97
    The latest release, the 2008 Tokaji Essencia from the Royal Tokaji Wine Company, was tasted over a period of three days. It is clearly cut from a different cloth to the 2007, disproving the idea that wines of such extraordinary sweetness conform to type. It is lighter on the nose than the 2007, with freshly cut tangerines, apricot and orange zest. There is a brightness here, a sense of energy. The palate is founded upon energy and tension, a silver thread of acidity that cuts through the layer upon layer of orange zest, Japanese yuzu, tangerine and honey. This is an elegant and you might argue, more "reserved" Essencia compared to the 2007. The alcohol is slightly higher at a "whopping" 4%, a relatively easier Essencia to consume compared to the unctuous previous vintage. While it might not achieve the concentration of the 2007, the 2008 Essencia remains an otherworldly feat of nature. I actually shared the remaining bottle with winemakers from Argentina and Portugal in Hong Kong and they became wide-eyed with amazement. That's the magic of Essencia. It might constitute blasphemy, but the freshness means you can enjoy this now, or as my drinking window suggests, wait another 100 years, as temporally fantastical as that sounds. Tasted November 2016.

Other Vintages

2007
  • 100 Robert
    Parker
2003
  • 95 Wine &
    Spirits
2000
  • 97 Wine
    Spectator
  • 95 Wine
    Enthusiast
1999
  • 100 Wine &
    Spirits
Royal Tokaji

Royal Tokaji Wine Company

View all products
Royal Tokaji Wine Company, Hungary
Royal Tokaji Wine Company Winery Video

Royal Tokaji was founded in 1990 by well-known author Hugh Johnson and a small group of investors who were inspired to restore and preserve Hungary’s precious wine legacy after the fall of Communism. Tokaji is the world’s original sweet white wine – the “cult wine” of the 18th and 19th centuries – and the Tokaj wine region was the first to have classified vineyards. At the end of the 17th century, Prince Rakoczi classified the finest vineyards into: great first growths, first growths, second growths and third growths. Royal Tokaji owns five of those first and second growth vineyards, including one of Hungary’s two great first growths: Mézes Mály.

The winery produces a range of exceptional wines from dry to sweet, including several single-   vineyard aszú (botrytis-affected) wines and Essencia, the free-run juice of botrytised “raisins.” The wines’ distinct character results from the varied volcanic soils of the classified vineyards, indigenous grapes and yeast, traditional winemaking methods and barrel-aging in the winery’s 13th-century underground cellars. Richness with vibrant acidity is the hallmark of all the Royal Tokaji wines.

Image for Other Dessert content section
View all products

Apart from the classics, we find many regional gems of different styles.

Late harvest wines are probably the easiest to understand. Grapes are picked so late that the sugars build up and residual sugar remains after the fermentation process. Ice wine, a style founded in Germany and there referred to as eiswein, is an extreme late harvest wine, produced from grapes frozen on the vine, and pressed while still frozen, resulting in a higher concentration of sugar. It is becoming a specialty of Canada as well, where it takes on the English name of ice wine.

Vin Santo, literally “holy wine,” is a Tuscan sweet wine made from drying the local white grapes Trebbiano Toscano and Malvasia in the winery and not pressing until somewhere between November and March.

Rutherglen is an historic wine region in northeast Victoria, Australia, famous for its fortified Topaque and Muscat with complex tawny characteristics.

Image for Hungarian Wine content section
View all products

Best known for lusciously sweet dessert wines but also home to distinctive dry whites and reds, Hungary is an exciting country at the crossroads of tradition and innovation. Mostly flat with a continental climate, Hungary is almost perfectly bisected by the Danube River (known here as the Duna), and contains central Europe’s largest lake, Balaton. Soil types vary throughout the country but some of the best vines, particularly in Tokaj, are planted on mineral-rich, volcanic soil.

Tokaj, Hungary’s most famous wine region, is home to the venerated botrytized sweet wine, Tokaji, produced from a blend of Furmint and Hárslevelű. Dry and semi-dry wines are also made in Tokaj, using the same varieties. Other native white varieties include the relatively aromatic and floral, Irsai Olivér, Cserszegi Fűszeres and Királyleányka, as well as the distinctively smoky and savory, Juhfark. Common red varieties include velvety, Pinot Noir-like Kadarka and juicy, easy-drinking Kékfrankos (known elsewhere as Blaufränkisch).

YNG239502_2008 Item# 511758

Internet Explorer is no longer supported.
Please use a different browser like Edge, Chrome or Firefox to enjoy all that Wine.com has to offer.

It's easy to make the switch.
Enjoy better browsing and increased security.

Yes, Update Now

Search for ""