Wasn't able to attend a local in-store tasting of wines from Crete, so I asked the proprietor to set aside a set for me. To go with curried grilled lamb chops, pine nut couscous and a green salad with an oregano vinaigrette last night, we opened these two wines:
2016 Lyrarakis white blend, $15
A blend of vilana, vidiano, muscat of Spira and sauv blanc, this was a great white wine. Light colored and light bodied but very complex, definitely coming in well above quaffer level, it had an amazing nose--could smell it from over a foot away--with white grapefruit, lemon blossom and attractive green notes of chive and tomato leaf. Opens very dry and finds just an engaging tad of sweet RS in the finish, but not enough to be offdry.
2015 Lyrarakis syrah blend $15
While this is just too immature for me to love-love at this stage, it went well with the lamb because it's a big-bodied, well-made, complex wine for the price. In fact, after tasting it, I did a double-take when I looked at the price tag still on the bottle--another of the wines I'd logged in earlier with this one was $24 and I just presumed based on what I was tasting that this was that wine. While it's basically showing all black fruit now--blackberry, plums, blueberries--underneath the extract there's definitely some earth and spice waiting to join the chorus.