This delicious Cretan red plays like a well-composed Bordeaux or Loire blend built around Cabernet Franc, with luscious dark berries and cherry-pomegranate tang intermingling with leather, earth, mint, black pepper, graphite, cedar/pine, and glycerin through to a smoky, spicy finish. It's quite rustic initially, so decant it for a bit, even for a few hours, or better yet let it sit for a day, by which time everything has come together, it's deeper, richer, and even more complex, and the rusticity has given way to Bordelais elegance. Lovely now, but with the stuffing to go further. A great find.

The comparison to Bordeaux reds certainly seems appropriate. Cedar-infused red fruit, a hint of herbal flavours, along with (to me) what seems like a fairly hefty dose of oak-infused vanilla. Solid value. Tasted July 2016.