Travelling to Balaton is always a joy, even if it’s to do with work. After checking out the website of skizbor.hu last summer, we thought how good it would be to stop by at Badacsony and have a good fröccs (spritzer) at Balázs Sike’s new wine bar. We called them while we were on the road and told them that we’d like to drop by. Okay, but those pictures on the site are only plans, they said. So no wine bar, no fröccs. Now it’s summer again and it’s Balaton time again. The wine bar is almost ready, while the wines are completely ready. We tasted the light, mainly tank-made Skizo series and fell for them. We talked to Sándor Mező and Balázs Sike. Firstly among the steel tanks and containers, in the cellar in Uzsa, pondering whether the product of such a “wine factory” could find a place in our selection. We then continued in the vineyard where with buttes (small hills) around us, the Balaton in front of us, we saw a vineyard plantation with perfect conditions. Healthy grapes, healthily thinking winemakers working with honesty, both in terms of the wine and in their heads. The pieces of the picture came together.
From where to where?
Sándor: From the Balaton to the Balaton. We are at home here in every aspect. We both come from here and we’ve always dealt with grapes and wine. Five years ago, thanks to our earlier friendship, we happened to start working together at Nagy and Nagy Kft. Today we count our blessings for it to have happened that way. The main profile of the cellar was to buy up the wines of small- and medium-sized producers which was a very decent idea and we were happy to come to work here. We’ve developed a lot of things since then. With the changing of the production structure and due to demand, the purchase of wines went more and more into the background. In the last vintage we bought grapes in from about 120 hectares, which we turned into wine using the most modern technology in a number of quality categories. All the wines, from bulk to bottled, are made exclusively from healthy Hungarian grapes. Of course, the aim from our side was to make our own wine of very good quality from the very beginning. It was a great opportunity that the owners let us select grapes from the 34 hectares of their own vineyards and to create new quality based on our philosophy in the cellar. Of course, in the meantime we are also in charge of the other wines, which amount to 12,000 hectolitres annually. That’s another reason why we have more personalities.
So that’s where Skizo comes from?
Balázs: Lots of things are “skizo” about wine. Viticulture and viniculture is often separated in the bigger wineries, which can be felt in the final product. Mass wines flood in from the EU while local farmers cannot sell their crop at a price that would be realistic. Thus, our traditional vineyards can find themselves in great danger when the crop is less but the costs are higher than on the more intensively cultivated areas. The problem is certainly complex, but people should communicate more realistically on the subject. What is also often harmful to the profession is that sometimes they put faulty wines onto a pedestal, creating styles from wine faults. It isn’t our aim to go against anyone, but only to make professionally proper, good wines from Hungarian grapes, and to make sure there is order in the cellar, as well as to help our knowledgeable wine customers to become more aware of the Hungarian “wine myth”. Ultimately the fate of Hungarian wine is in their hands.
How did you come up with the idea to make a newer quality level next to the commercial wines?
Sándor: We had the intention from the very first minute. If you look around here, you can see a landscape; a terroir with amazing qualities. On top of that, the technical background is given to make a good wine from our own grapes. We looked at each other in the beginning and there was no question. The outcome is Skizo.
What was the philosophy behind it?
Balázs: There was no philosophy. A part of Skizo is that every category can be done properly. That means pure, good bulk wine for the local pub or unique wines styles specific to their place of origin. We’ve drunk so much bad wine in our lives that we wanted to make our own good wine. We saw what was going on around us that gave us a further push to make our own wine well. We work cleanly, with steel tanks. The aim is to make fresh, crispy, exciting wines – one shot, one goal.
Sándor: We can only imagine ourselves here and doing it this way. Another series, traditionally the so-called higher quality series is being made within Skizo, in which we try to show the uniqueness of our varieties, our places of origin and ageing method, on a different level of consciousness.
Do you decide everything together?
Sándor: We are both ready to make compromises. Okay, maybe I’m a bit more ready than Balázs is. We’ve come from zero but nobody is interested in zero. Separately we couldn’t have created this story. We probably would’ve burnt out like so many other people. However, it works very well together. In many respects we complement each other. And at once there it is: two personalities.
