Greek Odyssey

Aspen, Colorado, may be best known for attracting winter sports enthusiasts with its world-class skiing, but every summer for the past 25 years an entirely different crowd has flocked to this Rocky Mountain town for a chance to sample the very best in food and wine. A select and often sold-out crowd of 5,000 self-professed “foodies” converges in Aspen for The Food & Wine Classic. They take cooking classes from culinary luminaries such as Chef Thomas Keller of the French Laundry restaurant in Napa Valley and legendary cooking icon Jacques Pepin, taste rare vintages presented by the world’s top winemakers and enjoy private dinners with such celebrity chefs as Bobby Flay or Mario Batali.

Kyma executive chef Pano I. Karatassos. The restaurant’s wine list boasts Old World wines full of distinct variety and personality.	Pair the herb-crusted Ahi Tuna, wild mushrooms ‘a la Grecque’ and pickled ramps with a dry, aromatic wine like the 2003 Organic Spiropoulos Mantinia Moschofilero or a 2002 Nasiakos Moschofilero.

Now in its 26th year, this event is sponsored by Food & Wine Magazine and features only top talent for its highly regarded, elite seminars. So when executive chef Pano I. Karatassos of Atlanta’s Kyma restaurant was invited to join a panel to discuss food and wine pairings for the standing-room-only “The Grand Wines of Greece” program, it was serious recognition of his expertise. As the son of successful Atlanta restaurateur I. Pano Karatassos (founder of the Buckhead Life Restaurant Group), he acquired early in life his love and respect for his Greek roots. And that serious passion for cuisine led the younger Karatassos to the prestigious Culinary Institute of America where he earned a professional degree. Now at the helm of award-winning Kyma, recognized as one of the best contemporary Greek restaurants in the U.S., Karatassos is well-suited to teach others about the foods and wines of Greece. “Well, I have to admit with names like Agiorghitiko and Moschofilero these wines are hard to pronounce,” he joked, charming the Aspen crowd. “But happily their great taste is easy to remember!”

Try a sparkling wine from Greece with Kyma’s mini dessert selection: baklava, loukoumades and galaktoboureki, such as the Domaine Spiropoulos Ode Panos or the Villa Amalia Brut Arcadian Peloponese.	The warm climate in Greece is a boon to dessert wines like Boutari Mavrodaphne and the Boutari Samos, N/V Muscat. Pair one with the banana ‘kataifi’ flourless chocolate cake and yogurt sorbet.

2007's Aspen Food & Wine Classic

The tasting of seven wines from Greece, moderated by noted wine expert and author Michael Bonadies, included interesting lessons in Greek geography and its 4,000-year tradition of making wines. Remember Dionysus, the Greek god of wine? But perhaps the most valuable lesson for wine lovers today was communicated by panel member Sofia Perpera, who is an oenologist and director of Atlanta-based All About Greek Wine: “Most of today’s wine drinkers have very little awareness of the current renaissance taking place in the Greek wine industry and have not had easy access to the quality that is now coming out of Greece.”

Perpera and Karatassos observed that Greek wines have a wonderful acidity that makes them a chef’s dream for food pairing, and with the more than 300 indigenous grape varieties that Greece has to offer, there’s a broad range of food-friendly whites and reds to discover. Additional information can be found at allaboutgreekwine.com.

The 26th Annual Food & Wine Classic in Aspen runs from June 13-15. Visit www.foodandwine.com/classic for tickets and more information.

See page two for info on the best of Greek wine.