Somloi Vandor, Harslevelu, 2023

Somlo is a lone extinct volcano rising straight out of the flat plains of northwest Hungary, one of the country's smallest and strangest wine regions, and one of the rare places on earth that makes almost nothing but white. Tamas Kis trained in Eger, home of Bull's Blood, before this volcanic butte hooked him for good, and his tiny Somloi Vandor project farms it organically with a minimal-intervention hand. This is Harslevelu, an indigenous Hungarian white whose name means 'linden leaf,' grown on basalt that soaks up the day's heat and radiates it back like a stove. The basalt shows up in the glass as smoke, salt, and a piercing line of acidity. Somewhere between Riesling and Chenin, but really its own thing entirely.