A Greek winery near Athens

Back to some positive stuff, now that the garbage problems seem to be over and the trash from the streets of Athens has been cleaned!

About two weeks ago, when the strike was still ongoing and walking in the center of town was not a pleasant experience, we chose to spend a Sunday afternoon at the Katogi & Strofilia winery, located south of Athens, about 1-1.5 hour from the center, 18kms before Cape Sounio.

The winery was organizing a Holiday bazaar - which as we learnt is a pre-Christmas tradition for them - offering visitors the chance to sample their wines, along with some accompanying snacks and Greek Christmas pastries.

It was a nice, sunny day, and the coastal road was fairly free of traffic. Quite a pleasant drive, even for us who are kind of used to it and take if for granted. The sea was blue and the sky was clear and sunny.

Katogi-Strofilia is the result of the merger of two formerly independent wineries: Katogi-Averoff (located in Metsovo, at the Region of Epiros) and Strofilia (located in Anavyssos, Attiki south of Athens). The result seems to have been a successful one, both commercially and quality-wise from what I'm reading... and tasting. The name "Strofilia" comes from the old, wooden, mechanical press that was used to extract the juice from the grapes.

Strofilia vineyeard, right next to the winery, in December

Winery entrance

Tasting room, behind the main building

Inside the tasting room. Pictures from the winery's past on the wall

I was most impressed with the wines produced in Epiros. The Traminer is a very aromatic dry, white wine while The Rossiu di Munte series showcases red, dry varieties (local and international ones)  cultivated at high altitudes in the mountains of Epiros, around Ioannina and Metsovo. You can read detailed information about  each wine in the winery's website. We bought some bottles for Christmas gifts and a few more for personal consumption... Again, you will find tonnes of details on the company's bilingual website.

Nice wrapping net, to protect the bottles...

Here they are... net-less, on our kitchen counter

An interesting linguistic notice is that many of the names are in the "Vlach" language, which was heavily used in Metsovo and other areas in Northern Greece. The Vlachs were a nomadic people, mostly practicing commerce and herding sheep, traveling between the areas of the current Balkan countries. They have for long been assimilated into the existing Balkan countries but you can still find traces of their culture here and there. The "Floara di Munte" (Mountain Flower) is another Vlach-named wine; a sparkling one for that matter,  made from the local Debina grape variety, which we will be drinking tonight, in lieu of champagne, to welcome the new year!

Getting there (updated 2013-03): First of all, make sure the winery can accept you on the day you want to visit. To get close by, take one of the "KTEL Attikis" (peri-urban) buses leaving almost every hour from Egyptou Sq. in the center of Athens going to the direction of either Anavyssos or Paralia Fokaias or Legraina or Cape Sounion via the coastal road. With either of these you may get off at Anavyssos (1.5hr. away ) and take a short taxi from there to the winery.

P.S. The name of the winery comes from an old winery machine. It is not connected with the Strofilia wetland  and forest in the west of Greece.

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