5 Hungarian winners in Hanoi World Luxury Restaurant Award

July 26, 2017

5 Hungarian winners in Hanoi World Luxury Restaurant Award

World Luxury Restaurant Award is a relatively new phenomenon – they started to give awards only last year, and 2017 is the second time awards are given. It is a really global organization: the company seats in South Africa, Stellenbosch, the last year gala event took place in Switzerland, and this year gala event was held on 22 July in Hotel Marriott, Hanoi, Vietnam. As they say: „The World Luxury Restaurant Awards™ aims to highlight special features of restaurants, thereby increasing competition globally and ultimately raising the level of food quality and the standards of service in the luxury restaurant industry.”
Restaurants can be nominated by food critics, bloggers, guests and either by themselves, then a registration fee of 350 GBP is to be paid, and then the evaluation is based on guest reviews. „Nominations can be promoted by participating restaurants to create maximum awareness and attract votes by means of the official voting button that will be provided in advance. World Luxury Restaurant Awards™ may send an official representative to visit at any time after this nomination and will give notification prior to visiting any of the nominated venues.”

The five Hungarian best of the best

The list of winners is rather long, due to the huge number categories (there are 81 categories!), but consider the amount of restaurants competing at the gastronomic scene around the globe! Hungarian restaurants are well represented by five quality places:

The highest award, the global award was given to Tama Restaurant. Tama has also won a regional award for being the best fine dining cuisine restaurant in Eastern Europe.
Deak St Kitchen has received continent award in Hungarian cuisine category
Robinson restaurant has won country award for ambience / romantic atmosphere, Gundel restaurant for fine dining cusine and Prime Steak House for luxury steakhouse / grill category.

Tama, the global winner

The cosmopolitan Tama restaurant in the centre of Budapest is a relatively new restaurant. Best of Budapest 2017 has chosen Tama the best new restaurant. Its chef, Péter Kovács previously worked – among others – in Skylon, UK, in the restaurant of Adam Gray, and he frequently does staging in Michelin star restaurants. László Hegyi owner participated personally in the gala ceremony in Hanoi. „This award is especially important for us, because the evaluation is partially based on the opinion of guests, and thus it is a proof that we are on the right path” – commented Hegyi on the great result.

Béres Hárslevelű Sparkling

As for the cuisine, Tama offers a cosmopolitan cusine with a touch of oriental influence. As for the wine list, Tama has some exclusive French wines (like Chateau Latour 2001), some champagne and some wines from Transylvania, but the backbone of the wine list is a good selection of Hungarian wines. Apart from the highly recommended Kreinbacher Prestige Brut, you can taste a méthode traditionelle sparkling wine made of Hárslevelű grape in Tokaj wine region by Béres – something of a real curiosity!

House wine made of Furmint

The white wine of the house is again an indigenous Hungarian grape variety: Tokaji Furmint 2008 by Zsirai Winery from Mád, Tokaj wine region.

The wine lists goes on showing several beautiful wines mad of local grape:

Egri Leányka by Egri Borvár / Tóth Ferenc winery, Eger, 2014 (Leányka grape variety)
Gróf Buttler Superior Kadarka, Gróf Buttler Winery, Eger, 2013 (Kadarka grape variety)

For more info on the grapes, read our Grape Dictonary

Zsirai Tokaji Fordítás, Zsirai Winery, Tokaj, 2008 (Fordítás is style of sweet wines made in Tokaj, for more info read our Vocabulary