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Oenops Wines Limniona 2019
The nose is dominated by a beautiful mix of black cherries, raspberries, cranberry, and strawberry with hints of sweet spices, violet, and herbs. On the palate, it is juicy with a round mouthfeel and a beautiful balance of lively acidity and velvety tannins. Flavors of sour cherries and raspberries are harmonically combined with notes of herbs and spices, leading to a finish full of fruits.
Origin:
Drama, Macedonia, Greece
Grape:
100% Limniona
ABV:
13%
Producer Profile
Nikos Karatzas is the face behind ‘Oenops’ (= ‘wine face’). He is an intense, ambitious and confident in what he is doing. He studied in Bordeaux then became chief winemaker at a very young age at the high-profile Pavlidis winery, also in Drama, before setting up his own project in 2015. He is another member of the new generation, proud of Greece’s terroirs and indigenous varieties. He had his fill of international varieties in his previous job. Now his mission is to source great fruit and craft great wines from it. This is the focus of Oenops, and it ‘costs’ him 50,000 km per year, touring the country and looking for interesting projects. So he is probably best described as a micro-négociant , working in partnership with growers who share his ideas.
Grape
Limniona is an ancient red-wine grape originating in Thessaly, in eastern-central Greece. Despite long-standing confusion, it is not the same grape as Limnio, as modern DNA analysis has shown, nor even closely related; nonetheless, most available discussions and reviews fail to distinguish the two (Wikipedia redirects Limniona to their Limnio page, which does not even mention Limniona; Wine Searcher has no separate page for it). As with so many grapes in recent years, it was saved from disappearance almost entirely by the efforts of a single dedicated winemaker, in this case Christos Zafirakis of the eponymous winery.
Region
Viticulture first appeared in the region of Drama thousands of years ago. Myth has it that Dionysus himself introduced the local lords to the secrets of the vine, and that they, in turn, later helped spread its cultivation to the rest of Greece. A plethora of archaeological finds confirm the basis of the myth, the most important being the excavation of a temple to Dionysus that dates back to 400 B.C., located at the heart of the region’s viticulture zone.
Viticulture
Grapes are sourced from contract growers mostly from mountainous sites of Thessaly. After their chilling at 5οC, grapes are carefully sorted and gently destemmed, with a portion left whole cluster.
Vinification
Spontaneous fermentation takes place slowly in clay amphoras and 10% in open-top barrels of 500 l, providing the wine with impressive complexity and depth. Gentle pushdowns (pigeage) are practiced following daily tasting.
Wine is aged for 10 months in amphoras and concrete tanks, with only a small percentage in the old large barrels, in order to preserve all of its