Vranec

Vranec is the flagship red of North Macedonia and it is also grown across Montenegro, Serbia and Kosovo, where it is vranac. The name means black stallion, and it is a fair description of the wine: very dark, thick in the glass, high in alcohol, and firmly tannic. It is a native Balkan variety with no close relative outside the region.

North Macedonia's Tikveš valley is the centre of production, a hot dry basin on the Vardar river with long summers that ripen the grape fully. Montenegro grows it around Podgorica in the Zeta valley, on limestone gravel, and treats it as the national variety. Both countries make wine on a scale that has been aimed at export for decades.

The character is black plum, dried fig, black pepper and a bitter chocolate finish, with acidity that stays surprisingly firm given the alcohol. Cheap versions are hard and drying. The better ones spend time in oak, which rounds the tannin, and they age for a decade. The grape is one of the strongest arguments for looking at Balkan wine at all.