Better know under its French/English name "Muscatel" or the German "Muskateller" or "Muskat," this is a truly old wine: some experts maintain that the vine migrated unchanged all the way from its original homeland in ancient Persia and may have been the wine so venerated in the poems of Omar Khayyam.
Muscatel is cultivated in many Mediterranean countries, but also in Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, Germany, and Slovenia. Its big, densely berried grapes have a pronounced muscat taste and aroma - on hot, quiet days of late August, the fragrance from Muscatel-bearing vineyards can be felt for miles around.
In good years, Rumeni Muskat is a richly yellow wine quite distinguished by its unmistakable muscat aroma, with average alcohol content and mild acids; in poor years, the wine is rather thin. Like Traminec, Rumeni Muskat is not a wine to be aged by an amateur - even moderate variations in temperature, almost unavoidable in all but the large professional wine cellars, will quickly spoil the wine. A further note on the aging: properly aged Rumeni Muskat is a truly distinguished wine, but its characteristic muscat aroma diminishes or even completely vanishes in four or five years; the bouquet and taste of mature Rumeni Muskat are more like those of Renski Rizling or Laski Rizling.
Rumeni Muskat vine is very popular in Slovenia, quite frequently planted since the fruit can also be marketed as table grapes. But its distinctive bouquet can only be produced on the right kind of soils under specific climatic conditions. Therefore, the quality of Rumeni Muskat is rather inconsistent in all the areas where it is cultivated, the most stable being the produce of the Maribor and Srednje Slovenske Gorice areas. Recently, the wine has been cultivated with considerable success in the Vipava Valley and Koper areas of Primorje and the Bela Krajina area in Posavje.
Semi-sweet Rumeni Muskat should be served similarly to semi-sweet Traminec: at 8 - 10 °C (46.4 - 50 °F) as a dessert wine with Sachertorte or, if you have a chance to try it in Slovenia, with potica, a traditional cake with walnut, poppy, or tarragon filling. Semi-dry Muskat chilled to 10 °C (50 °F) goes well with piquant cheeses such as Gruyere, Camembert, Gorgonzola, or goat cheese.
