Gaia Vin Santo

One of the pioneers of the modern Greek wine revolution, Gaia Estate was established in 1994 by Greek winemakers Leon Karatsalos and Yiannis Paraskevopoulos. From the island of Santorini, this sweet wine has complex and intense aromas, of caramelized fruits such as raisins, apricots and figs. On the palate, it is sweet and very complex with notes of coffee, bergamot and again dried fig and a very long finish.  It's the perfect choice with a dark chocolate dessert. Although very sweet, the wine has balance and good acidity keeping it fresh.

Made from mainly Assyrtiko grapes, some of which are dried in the Aegean sun after picking to really concentrate the flavours. After about 10 days the grapes have dehydrated to the right level ready for pressing. Such the level of concentration that less than 100 litres of juice are yielded from each acre of vines. The resulting wine, which spends over 10 years in oak barrels.

Gaia's main aim is to show off the potential of the indigenous Greek grape varieties worldwide. Over the years they've grown steadily, when they started production was less than 10,000 bottles, now it’s in the hundreds of thousands. At Nemea the reds made from Agiorgitiko take centre stage, while on Santorini it's the whites made from Assyrtiko.