Connecting shores at the first Mediterranean Wine Symposium

East, meet West. West, East.

This article is also available on Hudin.com.

It goes without saying that the Mediterranean Sea is a tremendously large body of water.

As it spans some 3,700km, forming the southern boundary of what we define as “Europe”, its waters shimmer with undulations of blue and green, lapping along beaches that are stony and rugged more often than sandy and soft.

Every year millions flock to these shores to bathe in a sun that has allowed humanity to grow plentiful crops over the millennia ranging from wheat to olives to grapes.

Ironically, despite this sea serving to connect humanity historically via vast maritime trade routes, in the modern age, it can be difficult to move latitudinally from east to west, especially outside of the summer tourism months. If wanting to go from say, Spain to Croatia in February, one needs to make the journey not only on a Northern European airline, but also via a connecting flight through a northern airport.

This lack of connections hasn’t fostered a great deal of communication across the Mediterranean, especially when it comes to wine. There is after all a tremendous amount of common ground for winemakers in this region, but as someone who has traversed the south of Europe, from east to west for nearly two decades, I can attest that the exchanges on a vinous level are often less than what’s needed for this day and age.

Thus it was an excellent new initiative by the Perelada winery in Empordà, Catalunya to hold a “Mediterranean Wine Symposium” this past March 23rd. The ultimate goal is to serve as a bridge and connect all these points in a vast sea that will need to work together for the future.

Why now?

The day was opened by Borja Suqué Mateu, the fifth generation of his family to run the winery. He started by welcoming everyone and noting that the rainy days of the symposium were a bit of shock given the ongoing years of drought in the region. Once he finished his talk in well-poised English, I asked him, “Why now? What has your family seen as the need to start this platform as opposed to say, a decade ago?”

“We can easily see the effects of Climate Change and the various threats we face making wine in our regions. This growth of winemaking in England has come at the cost of the Mediterranean and we clearly need to get in front of our issues at hand.”

It’s impossible not to agree with Suqué Mateu as the British press (countless of which were in attendance) is chuffed to bits that they’re able to report on a rapidly-growing wine industry on their own shores that can produce wines that are finally better than “exceedingly crisp”. But what doesn’t get talked about enough is that this comes at the deficit of the southern wine regions in Europe potentially facing extinction.

This set the tone for the symposium and throughout the day, I was looking for how the various sessions of talks and tastings were linking together the greater Mediterranean as a whole. While I couldn’t attend all of them as there was overlap due to a rightfully packed schedule, what I found came in various forms.

A great taste of Greece

In what was easily one of the star tastings of the day, Master of Wine, Yiannis Karakasis took a packed room through a series of 10 Greek wines that were selected from the larger Great Greek Wines judging event that he started. Suffice to say, it lived up to its name.

What was comforting in the tasting was that the classics were still classic with Xinomavro and Assyrtiko wines showing very well. But Karakasis was keen to note that the success of Assyrtiko wasn’t lost on people and it’s been planted a great deal around Greece now, including the mainland. It’s important to point out that it’s very drought resistant and can be planted beyond the shores of Greece. Karakasis noted that it’s been trialed in Spain as well which shouldn’t come as a surprise given the similar climate and issues of water.

He repeatedly came back to the issue that so many Greek varieties, especially those from Crete, are late ripening. This is one of the few items left in the toolbox to deal with the ever-harsher summers seen in the Mediterranean and I’m glad he mentioned it. Whether we’ll see regions in say, Spain, Italy, or the South of France taking up these varieties in the near future remains to be seen, but these are the conversations that need to be had.

A very Med moment

At the talk by Maria Snoussi from Morocco on, “Climate change in the Mediterranean”, I had a bit of a sardonic laugh with a colleague next to me as initially it had the least attendance of any talk I was at that day. This, despite it being the most important. The talk was starting just as a casual lunch was wrapping up and people were busier eating and tasting the wines of 20+ Mediterranean wineries who were pouring their current releases. And the reason for my initial laugh was that it seemed exceedingly fitting for a Mediterranean wine conference.

Quickly however, people did come in and as Snoussi was giving her talk, it was clear that a reason for the initial lack of attendance is that much of what she was talking about is already very much known to Mediterranean winemakers who are facing the reality of it in the vineyards year upon year, with greater intensity.

The main takeaway Snoussi outlined is that the Mediterranean is a singular hotspot of Climate Change. It’s getting warmer 20% faster than the rest of the world. By 2050, the overall temperatures will increase by 4C, a much higher number than the 1.5C predicted for the world at large. Nights will be tropical all year round and ultimately, viticulture won’t be possible in the manner we see it today.

For anyone who lives in the region of the Mediterranean, they’re already seeing this in certain years and it’s clear as per Snoussi’s data that it’s only going to get dramatically worse. Also, there are 150 million people in the Mediterranean Basin who suffer water scarcity, today. At the moment this is concentrated in the southern and eastern shores, but it too will get worse.

At various points Snoussi apologized for presenting such depressing information but not knowing isn’t going to fix things.

How to define the Mediterranean

There were two other talks I attended which each took a different approach to showing how this whole region is a cohesive entity.

One was by Master of Wine David Allen entitled, “The Mediterranean and its wines as viewed by an ‘Intelligent Alien’”. Given that he’s the director of Wine Searcher, which holds the largest database of wines in the world, I was expecting to see some delving into technical insight to distill a thesis. Surely if there’s some oversold use for AI, this would possibly be it?

Instead, it was a talk that dipped around the core issue a bit, committing what I call the “Dub Step” which is when an MW sidesteps the main topic to bring in some other nuggets of wine information instead of staying on the singular point they’re presenting.

In following it around as best I could, I took away from his talk that the Mediterranean is a “state of mind” and that it focuses more on boutique wine production than any other wine producing region. Needless to say, I’m still hoping for more insight on the Mediterranean (or other regions) from the trove of information at Wine Searcher.

On the other hand, Juancho Asenjo’s talk on Malvasia did the exact opposite of Allen’s in that it worked to link the region together via this singular grape variety and historical context. While there were moments that it seemed like some varieties were being grouped together that in actuality, only share the name, it’s quite an interesting concept.

It comes down to stating that these ancient maritime links and more importantly, the Crown of Aragón was responsible for linking together and forming what we have largely derived to be the Mediterranean wine of today. Paired with this was also a tasting of various Malvasia wines that showed the vast differences and interpretations which in some way did hark back to part of Allen’s point that, while it’s true of many wine regions, there are many small parts that make the Mediterranean what it is.

To the future

The conversations had on that unseasonably-stormy Monday in the Empordà region were but a start to larger and more involved discussions and exchanges of information. It was an excellent and much-needed first step on what is going to be a longer and most likely difficult journey.

With that in mind, the organizers announced that the symposium will indeed be continuing, but, as the Mediterranean is vast, it will be shifting to a new location, this time at the Petra Winery in Tuscany, Italy.

May it continue for the coming years and may wine continue in the Mediterranean the centuries to come.

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