Amid Santorini's arid landscape, grapes are one of the few crops that flourish, thanks to a unique local method of growing vines. The resulting dessert wine is the pride of the island
My first taste of vinsanto is a delicious surprise; I tend to think of dessert wines as heavy — Christmassy, even — but this is gloriously light and eminently drinkable. The fact I’m drinking it at all is almost by accident. I ordered a glass simply to buy myself more time at this restaurant, which has the sunset view every visitor to Santorini is after: the caldera, scattered with white-painted, blue-roofed houses, set against the red and orange sky.
Grapes thrive under consistent conditions, but as the climate here is hugely changeable, a vertical vine doesn’t give the fruit the protection it needs from the elements. In response to this, the island’s winemakers began training their vines around low hoops: the leaves act as umbrellas against the wind, volcanic sands and heat of the sun and allow the grapes to ripen in the centre.
Just outside Fira, Santo Wines is one of only a handful of wineries on the island that produces vinsanto.Santorini assyrtiko grapes, the variety used in vinsanto, have Protected Designation of Origin status, as do the island’s yellow fava beans, tomatoes and vinsanto wine itself. For winemakers to maintain this PDO status — and to use the name vinsanto, rather than simply calling their product a dessert wine — the traditional ripening and ageing methods must be used.
Of all the vinsanto wines I try on my trip, the version at Hatzidakis Winery, which has been aged in French oak barrels for 16 years, is the richest, with sweet caramel notes that linger on the palate. Konstantinas believes their organic methods, with no chemicals used, have an enormous impact on the grapes. “You produce a good wine in the winery, but an excellent wine in the vineyard,” she tells me, recalling something her late husband Haridimos often said.
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