Once the darling of Hungarian wines, wine snobs have turned against Villány recently - at least that's the general feeling at Művelt Alcoholista ("Erudite Alcoholic") and among the blog's army of commenters. They argue that not only are wines from Hungary's premier red region heavy going, they are also increasingly priced like the finest Bordeaux grand vins. Meanwhile, critics of Villány argue that regions like Sopron and Eger are sneaking up on the outside with new and exciting flavors borne out of Hungarian winemaking traditions - rather than a perceived obsession with mimicking the French.

That's where József Bock, one of Villány's (and Hungary's) most celebrated winemakers, stepped into the fray, challenging the alkies to settle the score once and for all at a private blind tasting at his winery. Villány, Bordeaux and Tuscany, in a fight to the death.

The jury set about picking their top three from a selection of the best international reds as rated by leading wine mags, as well as the top tipples from Bock, Gere and Malatinszky. The results can be seen in full by scrolling to the bottom of this typically thorough entry, but to sum up, the Hungarian wines more than held their own, with Gere's 2003 Kopár scoring highest and Bock's 2003 Cuvée popping up in third.

Perhaps more interestingly, the Villány wines scored higher on average than their Bordeaux counterparts, but slipped below the two Tuscan wines in the race. Whether this proves that Villány is the new Bordeaux remains in doubt, but at least the Villány-bashers may be silenced for a while.