Joe:

I posted the same question on winepress.us and I got a good link:

http://www.funkcity.demon.co.uk/tokaj2.htm

My understanding of the Tikaji Aszu is as follows:

They start with a 136-liter barrel of base wine (13-15% alcohol, but
what kind of wine? dry, sweet?), then they mash between 3 and 6 puttony
(20-25 kg) of botrytized grapes to a pulp. Then they pour the base wine
over the dough and they mix it well. They soak that for 24-36 hours and
then they press. Then they pour the pressed wine/juice on a cask and
they leave it partially empty for 1-3 months. I assume that later they
top up the cask and let the wine mature for a number of years that is
equal to the number of puttony plus 2. I think that the base wine is
also made from Aszu grapes, but the grapes used for it are not
botrytized, although this is just a guess.

Here in Austin there is a wine store called Grapevine Market that has
three different labels of Tokaji Aszu, all 6 puttony, and priced in the
$70s.

The reason why I'm inquiring about Tokaji Aszu is that I'd like to try
to make a batch following the same procedure. No, it won't be made with
botrytized Aszu grapes, and no, I won't be aging it in a Hungarian cask
from a particular forest and that has already been aged for 12 years,
but nevertheless I intend to go through with this experiment. Instead
of botrytized grapes I'll use raisins. Instead of a Hungarian oak cask
I'll use a carboy and Hungarian oak cubes. The main question right now
is: what should the base wine be like?



Joe Sallustio wrote:
> Franco,
> I can help you when I get back to Pittsburgh, I'm in your home state
> right now. I have some books that talk about Tokaji Aszu and my
> neighbor is Hungarian so I've have several examples; both communist and
> the more recent. All were unbelievably good.
>
> As I recall it's made with Furmint grapes in a 30 gallon barrel; the
> number of Puttonyos (I know I butchered that) on the bottle is the
> number of 'pails' of botrytis infected grapes they add per barrel. 3
> is good, 6 is great and hard to find over here in the US; over that and
> it's called Essence in Hungarian. The pail is this leather bucket they
> wore on their backs while picking the grapes, literally one at a time.
> It dies on it's own. This wine was made well and was famous way before
> the French version, Sauternes.
>
> Joe
>
> Franco wrote:
> > That's what I'd like to know.
> >
> > The only thing I know is that they use botrytized grapes (not even sure
> > what kind of grapes), that they ferment it to a relatively low alcohol
> > content (10-11%), and that it has quite a bit of residual sugar. Can
> > anybody provide some other details about this wine? Like, what is the
> > initial Brix? What is the final Brix? How do they stop the
> > fermentation, or does it stop naturally before all the sugar is
> > consumed? Why does it age well considering the low alcohol content?
> > Thanks in advance for any information.