Athens

Harvest Week: In Greece, A Grown Up’s Wine, Made by “Kids”

The Greek wine grape harvest is almost over. The dry and hot weather conditions throughout the year helped the grapes ripen earlier than usual, around ten days ahead of last year – a meaningful number when it comes to the delicate business of selecting what to pick for the harvest. After the previous year, a disastrous vintage for many, producers in Greece’s major wine regions finally have something to be excited about. The harvest that has us excited, though, took place just an hour’s drive from Athens, in a lesser-known wine region near Corinth. Here you can find the tiny vineyard of John Papargyriou, one of Greece’s most celebrated rising winemakers, with his wines selling out fast both at home and abroad.

Athens

CB on the Road: Crete's Wines of Old, Made New

Crete, Greece’s largest island, is among the country’s most beautiful and interesting places to visit. Well known for its amazing beaches and unforgettable cuisine, the island also has a long history of wine making, dating back more than 4,000 years. The ancient Minoan civilization was one of the first to be deeply connected with wine. Viticulture and wine making are depicted on paintings in the Minoan palace of Knossos, while ancient wine presses have been found all over the island, with the world’s oldest in Vathypetro, just a few kilometers outside Heraklion, the capital. The Minoans were the world’s best-known merchants of the time, and amphorae carrying Cretan wine have been found in digs all over the Mediterranean basin.

Athens

CB on the Road: Winemaking in Naoussa

Just an hour’s drive from Thessaloniki, right in the heart of Macedonia, beautiful Naoussa is a food and wine lover’s paradise. Full of tasty mezes and specialties made of pork and veal, as well as amazing pies, the local cuisine has evolved with the wine and tsipouro culture of the area. Vineyards are located all around Naoussa, climbing the eastern slopes of Mount Vermio (6,730 feet) and lying at altitudes of 500 and 1,100 feet above sea level, exposed to mostly continental climate, with icy-cold winters and hot summers cooled down by light sea breezes from the Aegean. This was the first area in Greece to receive an appellation back in 1971 and has served as a model for the Greek appellation system since.

Athens

Greece's 2015 Wine Harvest: Smaller Is Better

There is an ancient saying in Greek, Theros, Trygos, Polemos, meaning “wheat harvest, wine harvest and war”: All three are situations that need immediate attention and cannot be postponed until later. Hopefully there will be no war, but having completed the wheat harvest, we are nearing the finish line of the wine harvest.

Athens

Dionysus Returns: The Greek Wine Revival

There’s been a revolution taking place in Greece over the last couple of decades, and it doesn’t have much to do with the political and economic turbulence troubling the country – it’s all about wine. Wine in Greece, of course, has ancient origins: The first traces of it were discovered on the island of Crete and date back to 2500 BCE, during the Minoan civilization, and the oldest winepress in the world was found in the ruins of Vathypetro, near Heraklio.