Iliana Malihin "Amygdalos" Vidiano Rethymno 2021

Press 2 • April 2023 Direct Press Selection

Iliana Malihin is from Athens but used to summer with her grandfather in Crete. She loved it so much that she made a beeline for Crete after graduating from Oenology school in Athens — the opposite of the more typical flight of young people from Crete to Athens. Crete is the ancestral homeland of the Minoans, and the wine culture they started there is not just some of the earliest on record, but some of the longest lasting. Iliana wanted to preserve the unique varieties there, and so she set up her winery in Rethymno, on the southern side of the island near the Libyan Sea. Dust from the Sahara actually carries across the water and lands in Rethymno.

Iliana, barely 30 years-old, has somehow united nearly 40 growers on Crete — mostly older men — to band together, get organic certification, and continue preserving the native varieties of the island. 

For the “Amygdalos” she is working with a grape called Vidiano. The plantings are 100-120 year-old pre-phylloxera vines plants at 800-900 meters on schist. Fermented and aged in steel tank with a year agin on fine lees. Less than 50ppm of sulfur total. 

We featured this same vintage in the April 2023 Direct Press, and it has only continued to improve. Smoky, flinty aromas are matched with fat and salt on the palate and notes of dried apple ring. This is a wine with a lot of gravitas and gastronomic depth. Sadly this vineyard was wiped out in August 2022 by wildfire but Iliana has been central to rebuilding the vines lost by her and her neighbors. Her influence and talents bring to mind Arianna Occhipinti, who Iliana interned with. She is one to keep an eye on and one whose wines I will be squirreling away. Jonathan Kemp