If you visit Kutjevo, you will hear the story of a passionate love affair between Empress Maria Theresa and Baron Franz von der Trenck (Franjo Trenk in Croatian), who allegedly spent an entire week in 1741 in an old wine cellar in Kutjevo, enjoying the intoxicating powers of its wines. The story is corroborated by notches on the wall and a dent in the center of a stone table, which supposedly grants all your romantic wishes if you place your palm on it.
Ilok wines, which are used in some of the highest ceremonies to this day. The Traminer from Ilok cellars that was used during the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II is still talked of. 11
One of the largest barrels in the world, which can hold up to 53,000 litres of wine, is used during wine production in the old Kutjevo cellar. An even larger one, with a capacity of 74,000 litres, which can even hold the Kutjevo barrel, is used in the vineyards of Erdut. The Erdut barrel weighs 17,000 kilograms when empty, its insides are as big as a one-bedroom apartment, and the oalwood used in its construction took ten years to cure. Its impressive size earned it a place in the Guinness Book of World Records.
The people of Ilok will tell you how the princely family Odescalchi filled their wines in special containers in the old cellars, 200 years before Bordeaux and Burgundy. This was their way of protecting its reputation from merchants and resellers who mixed it with wine of poorer quality, and the tradition continued to the present day. If a bottle does not have a label stating that the wine was filled in an original bottle, then the wine was not produced in the Ilok cellars. It comes as no surprise that royals have always appreciated
Discovering Baranja's Unique Wine Cellars
Bor Anya or "mother of wine" - this is what the Hungarians call one of their most fertile wine regions, known for its fine white grape varieties, and increasingly for red ones, which make complex, structured wines. The highest viewpoint in Baranja, located on the Bansko brdo hill, offers views of endless rows of vineyards. Steep, deeply cut roads created by gullies specific to Baranja, called "surduk", are flanked by "gatori", unique wine cellars dug into the hill. The most beautiful
examples can be found in Zmajevac, a village known for its "Wine Marathon" (Vinski maraton), where several thousand participants gather every September. One of three stories of the largest wine cellar in Croatia, spanning 1200 square metres, which belongs to the Belje Winery in Knezevi Vinogradi, also belongs to the "gator" type. The now renovated and modern cellar was built over 500 years ago, and once served as a stable, armoury and dungeon for the army of Suleiman the Magnificent.
- 1 Kutjevo castle |IGOR šELER | 2 Barrel, "Erdutski vinogradi" vineyard | MATIJA šCULAC | 3, 9 Winery, Zmajevac | MATIJA šCULAC | 4, 5 Wine cellars, Ilok |IVO BIOčINA
- 6 Gatori wine cellars of Baranja / NENAD MILIc | 7 Winery, Zmajevac | BOŽIDAR PREZELJ | 8 Winery, Zmajevac | SAŠA PJANIc | 10 Baranja vineyards | NENAD MILIć
Slavonia Gourmet | For Wine Lovers..