This is a time of the year when all of the households are getting ready for Christmas. People have begun to decorate their homes and many are in the fever of baking different types of Christmas cookies. Decorating Christmas trees (fir trees) was not part of Greek tradition; sailing boats were decorated instead. This was[...]
The Story I have just woken up on a sunny Sunday morning and am getting ready to make my coffee. It’s still quite early and Ares, our dog, peeks at me from his blanket, without even bothering to lift his head as he decides that it’s too early to get up. I place the capsule[...]
You know how we always seem to put off things that are close at hand? I’ve climbed up the hill to Acropolis only when I was supposed to take friends who were visiting from another country. The same goes for so many other monuments or places of interest, among which are the vineyards of Attica.[...]
I met Panagiotis Dimitropoulos of the Sant’Or Winery http://www.santorwines.gr/about a month ago, at his winery at Santameri. The winery is at 600m above sea level, 30km from Patras. On the day we had arranged to visit, it was raining cats and dogs for the whole three hour plus drive. I smiled to myself as I[...]
Choriatiki (Traditional Greek Salad) The ultimate taste and picture of summer. A few years ago, I remember an Irish friend of mine saying to me: “You know the very first time I visited Greece, my friend and I sat in a little restaurant on the beach, wondering what we should order, and then as I[...]
Ouzo, Tsipouro and the Spring Sunshine Today is one of those days that you feel lucky to be living in Greece. Despite the misery, the financial crisis, the politics, and the irritability that seems to be going around, you wake up on a day like this and it seems as if everything is wiped away.[...]
How to Choose Extra Virgin and Virgin Olive Oil What is Olive Oil? Olive oil is made by pressing olives. Essentially, it is olive juice. What About Quality? Cold pressing gives better quality olive oils with more complexity of aromas and polyphenols. Not really “cold”, but with temperatures that have not exceeded 28oC. Quality is[...]
Muses Estate: A Family Affair Stelios, of the Muses Estate winery https://www.musesestate.com, I have known for a couple of years, as I happened to run into him at tastings or the WSET gatherings. I always thought of him as very polite, with excellent manners, and a nobility that doesn’t arise from birth rights, but from[...]
Nothing to Declare This time I decided to play a game. I will be looking at a wine label from a particular winery, and I will try to make inferences about the character of the winemaker. I may end up totally wrong, but I thought it might be fun to work the other way around.[...]
A Legend at Forty? A Legend at Forty? How many winemakers do you know who have managed to make a name for themselves, completely by themselves, and from a country that is not exactly well known for its production of wine? And hardly forty years old. Probably very few. Apostolos Thymiopoulos is one of them[...]
Can Wines Speak About Their Producer? Have you ever considered how many things show other people who we are? I’m sure you have never once considered that your profession, or the way you choose to practice it, reveals your character. If into this equation we include a factor like, let’s say, you’re a maker of[...]
I’ve been eyeing this winemaker, Thanassis Parparoussis, for some time and I wanted to get to meet him. I’m a big fan of his wines but I’d never managed to talk to him; mostly it was his daughters that I had seen at wine exhibitions. So, the time had come for Nikos and I to[...]
Dimitris Kostelenos is the eldest son of the family and he kindly agrees to show us around the nursery http://www.kostelenosfytoria.gr/. A very polite and motivated young man, who is obviously very involved with the family business. Dimitris takes us to the part of the nursery with the parent plants and explains: “we take cuttings from[...]
I always define myself as a ‘people lover’ and when I get to meet people like George Kostelenos and his family, I confirm why that is so. I had called him about a month, or so, ago to ask if I could visit the nursery and ask him a few questions about olive trees. On[...]