We drove through Corinth and along the coast highway. After a few hours, we decided we were hungry so we stopped in the small town of Derveni and found a taverna. It was unfortunately empty, never a good sign. The owner ushered us to a table, sat down with us, took out a pad of paper and explained to us what we would like for lunch as he wrote it on the pad.
We need not have worried. We started with a fabulous fish soup, then skordalia (potatoes mashed with a near lethal amount of garlic), grilled squid stuffed with feta, a whole cod perfectly fried in cornmeal batter, and horta, a green vegetable, cooked in olive oil. We declined to order wine as we were driving, but the taverna owner was convinced that his food could not be fully enjoyed without it, so he gave us each a small glass on the house. Then he brought us dessert, candied orange peel in honey syrup, the perfect ending to a wonderful meal.
Thus fortified, we continued along the coast to Patras, the sparkling Gulf of Corinth on our right and scenic mountains on our left. We stayed at a nice hotel in Patras, and headed out the next morning to visit the Achaia Claus Winery. This winery is older than Canada, having been founded
in 1860 by a German winemaker, Gustav Claus. It sits atop a high hill, with grapes growing on the slopes below. The several stone buildings include large storehouses in which there are hundreds of barrels of Mavrodaphne de Patras, each holding 2500 litres. Some of these barrels date as far back as 1907. There are some barrels that are even older, but these are commemorative vintages and the wine is not for sale. There are two barrels from 1873, and we were told these are the second oldest barrels of wine in the world.This is not the only production facility, as the winery produces 25 million litres of wine per year, mostly for export to Germany, the USA, and Canada. They make many different wines, including dry reds and whites, plus a very good sauterne-like dessert wine made with muscat grapes, as well as the Mavrodaphne. Mavrodaphne is the variety of dark red grape from which the wine is made. It is named for the dark-eyed fiancee of Gustav Claus, (Mavros means dark, and Daphne was her name) who died before they could be wed.
The winery has survived many challenges, including being occupied by the German Army during WWII. Apparently, the German founder had laid down commemorative barrels on the accession of Kaiser Wilhelm, and honouring Baron Otto Von Bismarck. When German officers came to these barrels during a winery tour, they immediately snapped to attention and saluted them. There were also members of the Greek resistance working at the winery, so the British never bombed it.
A group of school children, about ten or eleven years old, was about to take a tour of the winery when we arrived. The tour guide, Tonia, insisted that we join that tour because the next one wouldn't take place for another hour. She told us later that she immediately told the kids in Greek that foreigners had joined the tour, and the kids had to be on their best behaviour so the foreigners would not go back to their country and report that Greek school kids were badly behaved. It seemed to work, as the kids were quite attentive to her talks about the winery, and didn't even become restless when she switched to English at each stop on the tour for our benefit.
When we were passing the oldest barrels, we noticed that two of them had a slight leak, and a substance like dark molasses had collected where the wine had seeped out. I tasted this on my finger, it was sweet and sticky, tasting wonderfully of dried figs.
When the tour finished the school kids got back on their bus, and we went back to the tasting room to sample the wines we had seen being made. After the teachers from the school tour had finished buying their wine, we started to have an interesting conversation with Tonia about the wines she was giving us to taste. I told her of a dessert I made using dried figs poached in some Mavrodaphne de Patras. She responded by giving me a recipe book of dishes using the wine, some of which will undoubtedly be served in Yarker.
And then, all hell broke loose. Two busloads of senior citizens had turned up unannounced, on a day trip from Athens, and they all crowded up to the bar, pushing and jostling, for their free tasting glass of wine. They were lined up four deep, pressing us helplessly against the bar, as Tonia frantically filled plastic glasses and passed them out to the insatiable seniors, who seemed to come back several times for refills. There was a lot of muttering in Greek about foreigners taking up space at the bar, and having wine that they weren't being offered. One elderly gent, tired of waiting for a refill, grabbed one of the open tasting bottles from the end of the bar and started drinking from it. Then they started buying bottles of the cheapest wine, shouting out their orders over each other as they continued to jostle and elbow at the bar. While all this mayhem was going on in the tasting room, several of them slipped outside, got out their kitchen knives and began harvesting vegetables from the winery grounds into plastic bags.
After they finally cleared off, poor Tonia had to take a few minutes to collect herself, and we bought our wine, including a bottle of ten year old Mavrodaphne de Patras. We resisted buying the collector's special vintage blended from wines dating back to 1896, bottled in 2004 to commemorate the Athens Olympics.
Only 108 bottles of this were made, they are all numbered, and they cost around 1400 euros.Only a few are left.We left the winery in high spirits, promising to sent Tonia the picture we took of her. We continued on through the mountains to Kalavryta, for our next stop.
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