Memorable Pairings of 2011

Well, of the last few months anyway. There have been a few truly memorable drinks and eats in the past months that I never found a way to write about here. So I'll compile them in a best-of-the-unposted list from the last part of 2011.

I was in Jerez in October, and one night I had dinner at La Carbona with Peter Liem and Eduardo Ojeda, the cellar master at La Guita and Valdespino. Eduardo brought several ridiculous bottles to this dinner, one of which was a bottle of La Guita Manzanilla Pasada...but from the mid 1970's! That's right, a Manzanilla Pasada that had spent the past 40 years in bottle. I'm telling you, the idea that Fino wines cannot age is simply wrong. When they are well made and stored properly they can be wonderful. This wine was stunning in its complexity, and also in its freshness.

We drank it with a perfectly grilled bone-in strip steak (I think that's the cut, anyway - you butchers out there can correct me based on the photo if need be). This steak would fare well against anything served at steak temples in NYC - seriously. And La Carbona is by not even a steakhouse. The pairing was fantastic - the umami depth of the wine complimented the meat and the freshness of the wine enlivened and cleansed the palate. An experience I must repeat at some point.

And more Sherry...Joe Salamone was also in Jerez in October, and he returned with a very fine bottle that as of now is unavailable in the States, a special Palo Cortado from Gutierrez Colosía, the very fine producer in El Puerto de Santa María. The average age of these wines is at least 40 years and the wine is a complexly concentrated elegant thing of finesse and beauty.

We drank this wine with home-cooking style Japanese food. It was great with everything, but drinking it with these fried oysters with miso and seaweed was among the most thrilling and delicious pairings I experienced all year. Savory briny sweet complex harmony.

I ate dinner with a few friends at Prune in the fall, and one of them drove in from Rhode Island with several absurd bottles in tow, one of which was the 1972 Leroy Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Lavaut St Jacques. The wine was closed down hard at first, not so unusual for a wine that's been under cork for the past 40 years. But it opened up and showed beautifully, with savory earthy tones and even a bit of very gently stewed fruit. Such a great treat, to be able to drink a majestic old wine like this. We ate all sorts of good things at Prune, and I am not sure, but I think we drank this wine with lamb sausages and all of us were swooning.

Peter generously brought a bottle of Selosse Champagne from France for my birthday in the fall. It is a new release called La Bout du Clos, a wine made entirely from that same vineyard in Ambonnay, from the 2004 vintage. This wine was a bit more quiet than other bottles of Selosse that I've experienced, the oxidative streak not as strong, the supple fruit and saline minerality of the wine doing the talking. It was a special treat.

Peter made a lovely dish of Champignon mushrooms and daikon radish simmered in dashi to go with it - a perfect harmony of savory flavors and aromas. And a concrete reminder, if we needed one, that Champagne is a great table wine.

Why, on Christmas eve my friend Dan Melia opened an absolutely gorgeous bottle of 2006 Marie-Noëlle Ledru Saignée Rosé, and we drank it with excellent grilled cheese sandwiches and various pickles. An unusual pairing, maybe, but Champagne is great with fried food, and the pickles didn't intrude at all. Ledru's Saignée is so very vinous, it's like drinking red wine that happens to have a few bubbles. The wine unfolded slowly and gracefully and was best right as it vanished, a compelling merging of fruit and mineral concentration with textural finesse and grace. Note to self: buy everything Marie-Noëlle Ledru makes before she stops making Champagne.

I've never had Violane before, the sans-soufre cuvée by Benoît Lahaye. This bottle comes entirely from 2008 and is a blend of equal parts Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. I love Lahaye's wines, I love their clarity and focus, their delicate yet powerful expression of Pinot Noir from Bouzy. I loved this wine too, although it is definitely different from the other Lahaye wines I've had. First of all, there is no sulfur, and the wine shows an oxidative undertone that frankly reminded me of some of the Selosse wines I've had (yes, the wine is that good). There is an intense concentration of fruit aroma and flavor and the finish never really ends. We drank this wine on its own, and it was a wonderful pairing. I am drinking the dregs on day two as I write this, and gnawing on a piece of country wheat bread, and it is good.

I haven't had a wine from Santorini in over a year now, as after an initial love affair, I had a group of wines that showed too much sulfur and not enough deliciousness, and I kind of retreated. Not sure what I will do now, after this wine. Peter and I were trying to decide what to drink the other night with a dinner of breaded and fried veal cutlets, cauliflower with cumin, king oyster mushrooms, and garlicky greens. He saw a bottle of 2007 Sigalas Barrel Fermented Assyrtiko in my wine fridge and asked that we open it. I would never have picked that wine, and wow, was it a great pairing.

We decanted the wine about two hours before drinking it, and it was fantastic. The aromas were clear and fresh, vibrant. The wine has a unique aromatic profile, and now that it is maturing, it is articulate and detailed. For me the primary aroma is pumice - the volcanic rock. There is citrus fruit too, something floral, a Burgundian barrel-influenced sweetness, and all infused with this lovely slightly smoky savory-ness. Great freshness and acidity on the palate, balanced, and expressive. Simply delicious wine, and seems like its only beginning to grow into itself. The wine went so well with the veal cutlets, which I topped with a little deglaze of butter, lemon and chopped salted capers. It worked with the earthy cumin notes of the cauliflower and the savour of the mushrooms too. It was surprising to me how this wine offered enough richness to pair with everything on the plate, but also the brightness and refreshment to balance the meal.

This last one reminds me, as a new year approaches, of the value of being open minded, of welcoming new experiences, of being informed by and considerate of what I've learned to be true, but also of wanting to be wrong about things - of learning continuously. I hope that your 2011 ends in a lovely way, and that our 2012 is filled with happiness and learning and many exciting new pairings.

A Load of Santorini Assyrtiko Wines

The other night a few friends helped me to taste through a load of Santorini wines. I've discovered these wines only recently and am still just beginning to understand them. Here are the basics, as I understand them:

--Assyrtiko is the most important grape grown on Santorini. It is yellowish and fleshy, and it retains its vigorous acidity even when very ripe. The other grapes that commonly appear in Santorini wines are Aidani and Athiri.

--Santorini sees a lot of sun and a lot of heat. Vines are trained in coiled baskets in order to shield the grapes from the sun. Even still, alcohol levels tend to be high.

--Soils are primarily volcanic rock and pumice. The pictures I've seen make it seem as though there is little soil, as I understand soil to be, in the vineyards of Santorini.

--Vines are very old - supposedly the average age on the island is about 80 years old. And the vines are un-grafted, as Phylloxera seems not to have taken root, so to speak, on Santorini.

--The wines really do need a few years to settle, to show their graceful side, as they are intense and assertive early on.

I tasted some of these wines before and found them to be rather compelling. On this night I wanted to drink them with dinner. And that didn't happen. I had friends over, I made dinner and didn't get to focus as I would have liked. But there was wine left in all but two of the bottles and I sat down with them thoughtfully on day 3. I'll share some notes, but first a few thoughts.

There are some sulfur issues with these wines. It can be confusing - are those smokey volcanic rock aromas, or sulfur aromas? With some bottles it was clearly sulfur, with others I felt confused. Another thing - the alcohol can be a bit jerky, particularly with the barrel fermented wines. That said, the best wines show a truly unique character - there are elements of sea spray, legumes like lentils or peas, and the minerals really smell like pumice, like the rough stone your mom might have had in the shower. Lastly, the 2007 vintage seems to be my favorite, although it is not one that the wine makers said was particularly good. Here's what we drank, in order of drinking (all notes are based on day 3 drinking):

2009 Sigalas Santorini, $20, Diamond Importers. I've had this wine several times now (most recently with lunch on the day before this dinner) and it shows a little differently each time. This one was smokey and savory with vibrant citrus fruit. The acidity is strong and the wine feels energetic. The bottle we had on the previous day with lunch showed more fruit, this one was more savory. In the end, I think this will do well with a few years in bottle.

2009 Gaia Santorini Assyrtiko Wild Ferment, $24, Athenee Imports (This wine was received as a sample). As the name implies, this is fermented with naturally occurring yeasts. There is a strong floral element to the nose that I like. This is a powerful wine, very rich and heavy, intense on the finish. Although I recognize that there is quality here, it's just too weighty for me in the end.

2008 Gaia Thalassitis, $22, Athenee Imports. Even on day 3, the sulfur just obscures the wine for me. Actually, I thought it more difficult on day 3 than when we had it with dinner. I hear that this needs time in the bottle, but I'm just not convinced about this wine.

2007 Sigalas Santorini, price unknown, Diamond Importers (This wine was received as a sample). On day 3 this is without any question the best of all of the wines. It is perfectly integrated, graceful in its assertive power, pure, and clean. There is a top layer to the nose of white fruit, if that makes any sense. Under that there are stones, creamy lees, and sea spray. This is just a lovely wine, and if the 2009 is going to turn into this, then I'm in.

2007 Estate Argyros Santorini, $21, Athenee Imports. The nose was either very smokey or full of sulfur, and there was discussion about which was which at dinner. On day 3 there was no sulfur that I could detect. The nose was quite lovely with green peas or some sort of raw legume, and that smokey pumice sea spray thing that I get at the end of many of these wines. The palate, however, was not easy. The acids are so bright that it is literally like inhaling the spritz of a lemon, and it didn't feel balanced to me. Food helped, but not enough to make me go buy this again.

2007 Hatzidakis Santorini, $20, No import label (used to be Trireme Imports). This wine is 90% Assyrtiko, and then 5% Aidani and Athiri. I've had this wine several times now with different results each time. This bottle, sadly, was not the best one. There might be some botrytis, there is a lot of honey, some alcohol juts out. It shows on the palate too, the alcohol warmth, but it is basically a balanced wine. Other bottles have shown more of the sea foam and lentil thing that I find compelling.

2008 Sigalas Santorini Barrel Ferment, price unknown, Diamond Importers (This wine was received as a sample). At the big Santorini tasting in May I was bowled over by the barrel fermented wines. This time, I think I preferred the stainless wines. The alcohol here is 14% and the oak is still dominant. There is a kernel of something floral, but it's all about the oak right now. The palate shows intensity and something salty, but as much as I might like to, I just don't have the experience seeing these wines age and I can't tell you what's going on here.

2007 Sigalas Santorini Barrel Ferment, $33, Diamond Importers. Is it the vintage? The extra year of aging? Who knows, but on day 3 this shows much better than the 2008. There is oak still, but also smokey pumice and preserved lemon on the nose. It is balanced and energetic on the palate with a gentle touch of sea spray on the finish. The oak flirts in and out though. Will the oak integrate over time, allowing the other components to show themselves? If so, this could be really good wine.

2008 Hatzidakis Nykteri, price unknown, Trireme Imports (This wine was received as a sample). The back label says that this wine is made from grapes of perfect ripeness harvested at night. I like Hatzidakis, but none of the wines showed particularly well on day 3, and this one was the most difficult. The alcohol is 15% according to the label and honestly I wouldn't be surprised if it were higher. The aromas are floral and very heady, but also hot, and there is something soapy in there. The palate is ripe and rich and to my taste, a bit overdone.

2004 Hatzidakis Nykteri, price unknown, Trireme Imports (This wine was received as a sample). Also 15% on the label, and still a huge wine, although a bit easier than the 2004. Based on the way these Nykteri wines showed, I'm more interested in the stainless wines from Hatzidakis.

More Tales from the Dark Side: Wine Retail Horror Stories

Ready for some more strange retail stories? Weird advice from the folks in the trenches? I know I am. Sorry if I sound like a flippant jerk, but here's the thing: it's easy for me to think that every wine store is like Chambers Street or Uva or Slope Cellars. When you are shopping at these stores and you have a question, the people who work there will answer it honestly or tell you that they don't know the answer. But sometimes the hunt for a specific wine leads me away from those stores and the few others like them, to random friendly neighborhood wine shops, and I am reminded that all is not right in the vast world of wine retail.

People love to answer questions, even if they have no idea of the factual answer. People love to criticize without any context regarding the object of their criticism. People love to make blanket statements that are misleading, and may or may not pertain to the issues at hand. And friends, I'm not speaking of the fine men and women who serve our country as United States Senators or Congressmen. I'm speaking of the people who work in our friendly neighborhood wine retail shops. And although you and I aren't really hurt by this because often times we know what we're looking for, imagine what transpires between these folks and 95% of the customers, people who just want a little advice on what to drink.

I think it is the responsibility of the wine store owner and manager to make sure that the sales staff knows something about the wines being sold. It's risky to make things up when asked a question because sometimes we customers can tell that you're making up the answer. And this does little to build trust between you, the seller, and us, the buyers. I'm not at all suggesting that retailers, or anyone else, should know everything. But if you are asked a question and don't know the answer, just say so. Ask another employee, ask the manager, or just leave it at that - "I don't know" is a fine answer, when it's the truth.

Some of the things I've been told by retailers lately make me feel very sad. If I had accepted these things as truth, as I'm guessing 95% of customers do when speaking with wine sales staff, I would be ignorant of my own ignorance (probably already true, but that's another story). Here are a few recent tales, Wine Retail Horror Stories... (I would love to insert drops of blood or something here, but Blogger for some reason does not enable that function).

They Shouldn't do that in the Jura
I was shopping at a large store in lower Manhattan, looking to buy a few bottles of Jacques Puffeney's 2007 Trousseau. There was only one bottle on the shelf, and the wax seal was a cracked mess. I asked a sales guy if he had more bottles. "How many do you want," he asked. "I'd like three," I said. "Okay, I'll grab two from downstairs.""Actually, the wax on this bottle is cracked and I want to cellar these for a while, so if you don't mind, I'd like three bottles from downstairs. I'm hoping for intact wax seals." Yes, I was being somewhat anal, but the point of the wax seal, as opposed to the typical capsule, is to prevent air from getting into the wine bottle.

The sales guy then says "They shouldn't do that in the Jura. The wax seals are always breaking and they don't do anything for the wine anyway. There's no difference whether or not the wax is chipped."

Now, I'm no scientist, but everything that guy said sounds wrong to me. Was he simply too tired to haul a third bottle from downstairs? Was he angry at the Jura and the lovely people who live there? Why say these things? I realized at this point that further conversation was pointless, and simply said "Fine, but I'd like three bottles with intact seals, if that's okay."

Doesn't that seem like a strange thing to say to a customer? That's a New Thing They're Doing in the Jura
Recently I was poking around in a wine store on the upper-west-side, a neighborhood joint that I had never before stepped into. Not the same store where I witnessed the Jura/Jurançon debacle, but it was the same afternoon. The selection was very good, and there were some slightly older vintages mixed in with the usual assortment of '07s, '06s, and '05s. I stumbled across a few bottles of 2000 Domaine de Montbourgeau L'Étoile Cuvée Spéciale, a delicious Jura Chardonnay made in the oxidized style. Two of the three bottles on the shelf had no vintage labels, the third had the 2000 banner at the top. Wow, I thought, I might have stumbled on a great deal here - the price is right. But wait - none of the bottles had wax capsules, and I felt as though Montbourgeau's wines always have wax seals at the top. Maybe these bottles were from an original shipment that arrived 6 or 7 years ago. I asked the very nice guy who had already competently answered other questions - "Have these wines been in the store for a while or are they newly released?"

"Oh these are new," he said.

"And this is the Cuvée Spéciale, the one made in the oxidized style," I asked. This was mostly to keep the conversation going, to help me to determine whether or not I could believe anything else he said about the wine.

"Oxidized style?" he asked. "This isn't oxidized. Why do you say that?"

Okay, so he doesn't know the wine. Whatever, maybe I can find out whether they bought it as a library release or if it had been sitting there for the last 6 years. So I said "But is this something you recently bought, or is this something that's been in the store for a while?"

"This is brand new wine," he said. "That's a brand new thing they're doing in the Jura."

I'm sorry, but if you're selling something you should know what it is. That's not asking too much - that's a very basic standard. Again, it's all well and good not to know something, but why pretend, like this guy did? Can you imagine how much nonsensical "information" is going out everyday to unsuspecting customers at their local wine retail shops...

Wine is Wine
When searching (in vain) recently for a specific bottle of Sigalas Santorini, I went to a wine store that I'd never heard of in Manhattan, just because an internet search said that the store carried the wine. I should have called to confirm before going, but I didn't. When they didn't actually have the wine in stock, the manager took an interesting tactic. He basically tried to make me feel like an idiot for desiring it.

"Why would you want Sigalas 06," he said. "That wine is dead now anyway."

"Hmmm," I said. "I tasted one recently that was delicious."

"No, you don't want that. Get a different wine," he said. "I have another Santorini wine back there now."

"Yeah, but it's the Sigalas specifically that I wanted."

The guy then said "Sigalas thinks he is doing something special, but he's not. Wine is wine, right?"

What can you really say to that? And how many people get their wine wisdom from this guy? Not every store can staff up with the best and brightest, obviously, but this is all too common at our neighborhood spots.

Am I wrong? Am I expecting too much? What do you think - how is the service at your neighborhood joint?

Santorini Wine Tasting

Last week I was lucky enough to attend the Wines from Santorini tasting. The wines of 10 different producers were present, along with some of the wine makers. Amazing timing, as it was only a week ago when my first Santori Assyrtiko kind of blew my mind. This was a great opportunity to taste more of the wines, to build a bit of context, so see which of the wines I would be interested in seeking out on my own.

A few general things - as tasty as the wines can be when very young, these are wines that show dramatic improvement with only a few years of bottle age. It seemed as though the young wines showed a bit of sulfur on the nose, and a few years in the bottle seems to be sufficient for this to dissipate. But the wine itself also takes on whole new layers of complexity. Also, there are some producers who clearly know how to use oak. I drank some delicious wines that were fermented in stainless steel, but my favorite wines of the tasting were fermented in or matured in oak.

And lastly, all of my favorite wines shared this pure salty seawater character that formed the foundation of the wine. But it's not seawater like you might get in Chablis - not a briny tidal pool kind of thing. It's more like sea spray, like the salty mist that happens when a wave crashes.

Here are some of my favorites from the tasting and a few notes:

2009 Domaine Sigalas Santorini Barrel Fermented Assyrtiko - this was too young for me to understand, and there was still a bit of sulfur on the nose, but the wine is creamy and deep with great balance and energy. If the next two wines are any indication, this will develop beautifully.

2007 Domaine Sigalas Santorini Barrel Fermented Assyrtiko - All told, this was my favorite wine of the tasting. Highly perfumed and heady with lemon and vanilla, smoke and salt water. A beautiful nose that forced me to return to this wine at least three or four times during the tasting. Balanced, bright, great depth, and wonderful intensity and lightness. Great wine. And I stood with the wine maker Paris Sigalas tasting these wines and asked him which of the recent vintages were best. He said 2006 and 2009. Those seem great too, but at the tasting it was the graceful elegance of the 2007 that really moved me.

2006 Domaine Sigalas Santorini Barrel Fermented Assyrtiko - Riper and richer than the others, smokey, and something almost chalky (but there is no chalk) on the nose. The "soil" in Santorini contains a lot of porous pumice - maybe this is what I was smelling. Broad and round on the palate with rich and saline influenced flavors, and something like peas or red lentils in there. That could be because I read Peter Liem's description of the wines in general, and he used red lentils. I did smell them though. I suppose had he said "rhinoceros" I might have smelled that too.

Photo of Paris Sigalas and Brooklynguy (on the right, cropped out) courtesy of Dr. Parzen.

Sigalas' stainless wines were great too, and he was an absolutely lovely guy. Serious but smiling. Dressed nicely and very classy, but obviously a get dirty outdoors of guy. Sigalas wines are imported by Diamond Imports.

I also loved the wines of Hatzidakis. Across the board they were simply excellent. The 2008 Hatzidakis Aidani seemed rather weird at first, but that's probably because until that point I had consumed nothing other than wines made from the fiercely acidic Assyrtiko grape. This one was more gentle and round, more floral, and it grew on me. I liked the menthol and tea on the finish - very interesting wine, and I'd love to have it with dinner. Call me crazy, but I'm thinking Szechuan tea smoked duck.

2008 Hatzidakis Santorini Assyrtiko was beautiful wine, salty and savory with deep flavors of herbal honey and smoke, and of course, seawater. This is fermented and matured in stainless steel. The 2008 Hatzidakis Nykteri, a barrel matured wine, was rich and deep with great balance, very energetic. The flavors seem a bit constrained still, but they are pure and nutty, smokey and salty. Compelling indeed. Hatzidakis wines are imported by Trireme Imports.

I couldn't understand the 2008 Gaia Thalassitis - it just seemed mute to me, too young. I'm curious about this wine and I hope to taste it in a few years. But the 2009 Gaia Assyrtiko Wild Ferment was open and absolutely lovely, very expressive and perfumed, sheer and delicate. The aromas are more floral, although there is still a bed of sea spray. Gaia wines are imported by Athenee Imports.

There were other good wines too, but I found these to be most compelling. What bothers me, is that I cannot find a place in NYC to buy most of these wines. I hope that changes soon.

I enjoyed these wines so much that I was inspired over the weekend to open one of the few bottles of Santorini wine that I have in my "cellar", the 2007 Hatzidakis Santorini, $22, Trireme Imports. This is a blend of Assyrtiko, Aidani, and Athiri. It is deep gold in color and seems like it's been around for a while. But it's just slow to unwind, and when it does it's fresh and vibrant and full of sea foam. There are savory lentil notes, something like eucalyptus, and a bit of honey trying to push its way out of the rock. This went beautifully with our dinner of roast black fish and braised turnip greens.

I need to drink more of these wines at home with dinner. And at these prices, I can actually afford to.

Santorini Dreams Become Reality

This story begins here, one of the many excellent posts on Peter Liem's now defunct personal blog. I remember reading it a couple of years ago and thinking "hmmm, Santorini, huh? Certainly sounds good from Peter's description. If I see one of those I'll try it."

Actually, this story really begins in June of 2005 when BrooklynLady and I were in Crete on our honeymoon. We ate some phenomenal food there. I'll never forget driving from the northern part of the island over some hills to the south, down winding breakneck roads in a crummy little 2 seat stick shift rental car, goats on the side of the road staring at us, the Mediterranean (that part of it called the Libyan Sea) taking up the entire horizon. We pulled up to some or other little beach and there was a restaurant, and they offered us a round red plastic bucket with maybe 10 plump sardines in it. They wanted us to select from among them for our lunch. Those fish, a simple salad with a cheese the name of which I have forgotten, but it is similar to feta, only much softer and creamier, and some blistered pita-type bread...hard to beat. The wine, let's just say that beer was a better option, and that's mostly what we drank in Crete.

I've never really looked for the wines Peter recommended, and maybe that's because I've never had a Greek wine that I could get excited about. But then a week or so ago my friend Adam wrote to me from a trip down south to tell me that he tasted something that he loved, something new to him. A wine from Santorini called Sigalas (one of the producers that Peter recommended). Okay, that's it, my turn to try them.

I bought a bottle, understood that it would be too young to drink, but that would not stop me from opening it almost immediately with something tasty from the fish people. And when I went to the market I saw this:

And I thought of stuffing the sea bass with oregano and thyme, lemon slices, green garlic slices, chopped black olives, and of drinking it with my Santorini wine, and imagined that it would be good.

So I gutted, salted, and stuffed, and scattered, but minus the oregano - didn't see any at the market. And I decided that some very thinly sliced white onions would be good too. The fish went in the oven and I opened the bottle just to see what was happening in there, to let it stretch out a bit before we really went at it. At first it was very lactic and yeasty, and very saline. If I didn't know what I was drinking, I might have begun my thinking in Muscadet.

The fish was done, I made a simple salad with a lemony dressing and mushed some Feta cheese through my fingers in a lame attempt to recreate the softer version that we had in Crete, and I cut two thick slices of good white bread. We were ready to go.

Did you know that there is, apparently, technique involved in artfully removing the flesh from a roasted sea bass? I know how to carefully lift the bones off one side of the fish, but there's that tricky initial set of cuts to make. I knew enough to salt the skin so it lifted away like paper. but I did an ugly job of it, let me assure you. I need a lesson in this department.

Anyway, we had our version of simple and delicious, evocative of our Greek honeymoon dinner. And this time the wine was utterly superb. BrooklynLady had no idea what it was and part of the way through her first glass she walked into the kitchen and said "What is this? I really like it."

2009 Sigalas Santorini, $20, Imported by Diamond Importers, Inc. In the 30 minutes or so it took for me to get dinner on the table, this wine found blossomed. If you read the link to Peter's post you already know that these are old vines, and that the vineyard techniques and the terroir are unusual. The wine tastes familiar and unusual at the same time. It really reminds me of a great Muscadet in its phenotype, but whereas Muscadet's complexities veer off towards things like fennel or anise, and briny ocean, this Assyrtiko's complexities are smokey and savoury. This wine had top notes of fresh lemons, minerals, and a creamy lactic tone, a middle layer of savory herbs and something almost brothy, and a bottom layer of smoke and ash. It is full of character, deeply complex, perfectly balanced, and altogether compelling wine. I'm very excited about this wine, and about Santorini, and I will be buying more.