Mavrodafni

Mavrodafni is a Greek red grape best known for a sweet fortified wine, and the two are so closely linked that the grape name and the wine name are the same on almost every label. It grows around Patras in the northern Peloponnese, and the style was commercialised by Gustav Clauss, a Bavarian who founded the Achaia Clauss winery there in 1861.

The method is close to that of Port. The fermentation is stopped by adding grape spirit while a great deal of sugar remains, and the wine is then aged in barrel, often outdoors and often for a very long time, sometimes in a solera style system. Heat and oxygen do the rest, and the result tastes of dried fig, raisin, coffee, chocolate and orange peel, with the sweetness cut by a firm tannic grip that the grape supplies naturally.

A dry version exists and is worth knowing about, because it shows a different grape entirely: dark, tannic and savoury, with sour cherry and a herbal note under firm structure. It is uncommon, and most of what is planted is still destined for the fortified wine. The name means black laurel, and the usual explanation is that the leaves of the vine resemble those of the laurel, though nobody is certain.