Is Xinomavro Greece’s Greatest Wine Grape?
The grapes that go into making Greece’s wines are multifarious and always have been, but this ancient winemaking culture is undergoing a renaissance with one particular, indigenous grape variety emerging in the top spot: Xinomavro.
With its dark skin and capability to produce structured, powerful, long-lived red wines of great complexity, the Xinomavro variety is a strong contender for Greece’s all-time best wine grape.
The variety is highly regarded in its native Greece as the finest red wine the country has to offer. With its characteristically high tannin and acidity, Xinomavro is structurally one of the greatest red wines in the Mediterranean and indeed Europe.
The word Xinomavro itself is a conjunction of the Greek words for acid and black, though this is often translated as black and sour. This gives some indication as to the flavor and structure of the wines made from the variety.
“Xinomavro has been cultivated in key winemaking areas of Greece for hundreds of years,” Yannos Hadjiioannou of Greek wine specialists Maltby & Greek told The Financial Times. “Now thanks to a shift in Greek winemaking away from international varieties back to indigenous grapes, and a new generation of young winemakers, it’s gaining its rightful place on the global viticultural map.”
Where is Greece’s Xinomavro wine grape variety grown?
Xinomavro-based wines are made across northern Greece, but the grape’s heartland is Naoussa in the hills of Macedonia.
Naoussa is the most important appellation associated with the variety, as its wines are required to be 100 percent Xynomavro. These are held in high regard and along with Nemea on the Peloponnese peninsula, are considered to be Greece’s greatest red wines.
However, Xinomavro is widely available across continental Greece. It is used in various other appellations, including Rapsani on the foothills of Mount Olympus. Here, it is blended with Stavroto and Krassato to make a dense, full-bodied red wine.
Elsewhere, the variety is blended with more international varieties like Merlot and Syrah in an attempt to soften its austere nature and appeal to a wider audience. These are only allowed under the regional PGI designations as many proponents of the variety believe it should not be “diluted.”
“What makes Xinomavro special is that it has that rare ability to transport the drinker to the place it was grown,” Noble Rot co-founder Mark Andrew MW told The Financial Times, “capturing the herbal perfume, plum, olive and dried tomato characters that are so quintessentially Greek.”
Food pairing
The star of Greece’s Orthodox Easter table, whole lamb roast on a spit, is the mother of all pairings for this wine, but any type of roast lamb is an excellent match, especially if garlic and herbs are involved.
On the vegetarian side, eggplant is an exceptional match, in almost any form. Imam bayildi, loved in Greece almost as much as in Turkey, is a classic. Other options include baba ganoush, ratatouille, or its Greek take, briam.
Bringing together lamb and eggplant also works very well.
Moreover, Xinomavro is an excellent food pairing wine with cheesy pasta, mushroom risotto, roast chicken and pork, or even a dry-aged steak where the tannins help cleanse the palate.
Top Producers of Xinomavro
Top producers for traditional Xinomavro include Dalamara (especially the Paliokalias label, though it has seen a price increase in the past decade), Markovitis, Kelesidis, Boutari, and Artisan Vignerons de Naoussa, while in Goumenissa, Tatsis is well known.
There are few people who have changed the profile of a variety singlehandedly as much as Apostolos Thymiopoulos did with Xinomavro. His various bottling from the instant classic, premium Earth & Sky to the entry-level Jeunes Vignes and the newer Naoussa Alta pioneered a new winemaking take on the grape.
Fresh, vivacious, fruit-forward, and drinkable on release without losing the trademark Xinomavro aromatics in the process, they were a huge success on the domestic market and helped substantially increase the visibility of the grape internationally.
With Xinomavro being increasingly planted around Greece, many newer producers, such as Oenops, have begun to operate.
The authenticity of Greece’s Xinomavro wine grape
The Naoussa Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) was established in 1971 and mandates the use of 100 percent Xinomavro grapes. Good examples age well due to the wine’s high acidity and tannin content and can be similar enough to wines made from Nebbiolo grapes. Comparisons are often made to Italy’s highly regarded Barolo. In Goumenissa, the grape is often blended with Negoska to produce very fruity wines with high alcohol levels.
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