What is Tsantiris Winery?

Tsantiris is a small organic winery at Ano Proespera in the north west of Ikaria, in the eastern Aegean. The family vineyard was planted in 1875 and the current winery was founded in 2000 by Konstantinos Tsantiris, a fourth generation winemaker, with his wife Domina Glarou.

Are the wines organic?

The vineyard is cultivated by biological methods without pesticides, and the wines are sold as organic under the PGI Ikaria classification. All cultivation and harvesting is carried out by hand.

What does clay vessel fermentation mean here?

The Vitina Begleri and Vitina Kountouro are fermented and matured in clay containers using wild yeast rather than cultured strains. Clay is porous and gives a slower, less controlled fermentation, which shows in the finished wines as a mineral, earthy texture alongside the fruit.

Where exactly is the vineyard?

On the slopes above Proespera, north west Ikaria, at 350 to 450 metres above sea level. The vines occupy around fifty stremmata, roughly five hectares, on dry stone terraces set between granite boulders.

What does the Begleri taste like?

Bright and golden in the glass, with citrus, green apple and fresh herb aromas, mineral acidity and a saline note that reflects the exposed coastal site. It is served chilled at 8 to 10°C and suits fish, seafood and white cheese.

Tsantiris Ikarian Wine | Gourmet Groceries

Discover the Unparalleled Quality of Tsantiris

The vineyard sits on sloping ground between 350 and 450 metres above the Aegean, on terraces of dry stone built between scattered granite boulders. Roughly fifty stremmata, about five hectares, are under vine. Nothing about the site is convenient: the terraces cannot be worked by machine, so cultivation and harvest are done entirely by hand, and each plant carries a small crop.

That constraint is the point. Low yields on granite at altitude, in constant sun and Aegean wind, concentrate what the grape has. The wines carry the mineral, saline character of the site rather than the imprint of a cellar recipe, and the range is built on three varieties, Begleri, Fokiano and Mandilaria, that are grown almost nowhere else.

What makes Tsantiris special

A family vineyard at Proespera planted in 1875, replanted and bottled under the Tsantiris label from 2000.
Dry stone terraces between granite boulders, at 350 to 450 metres above sea level.
Organic cultivation without pesticides, on around fifty stremmata of hand worked vines.
Indigenous Ikarian varieties: Begleri, Fokiano and Mandilaria, locally called Kountouro.
The Vitina bottlings fermented and matured in clay vessels with wild yeast.

Ikaria is a long, steep island in the eastern Aegean, closer to the Anatolian coast than to Athens, with a food and drink culture that stayed local because the terrain and the ferry timetable made it stay local. Wine here has always been made in small quantity for the household and the village table.

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The People Behind Tsantiris

Konstantinos Tsantiris, known as Kostas, is the fourth generation of his family to make wine at Proespera. He grew up with the working knowledge of his father and grandfather, then studied winemaking formally before deciding what to do with the family land. In 2000 he and his wife Domina Glarou left Athens and returned to Ikaria to rebuild the estate as a working winery.

The winery is run by the couple together with their children, Yianni and Nassia. It remains a small operation by any measure, with the whole range drawn from one vineyard and a handful of grape varieties.

How Tsantiris began

Nikolas Tsantiris started the vineyard on the family estate at Proespera in 1875, part of an Ikarian pattern in which almost every household kept vines and made enough wine for itself. That vineyard passed down through the family, and the recorded history of the estate now spans five generations.

The modern chapter began in 2000. Konstantinos took over the terraces his grandfather had worked, converted the cultivation to organic methods, and set out to put the island’s own varieties into bottle under a PGI Ikaria label rather than sell grapes or bulk wine. The purpose was documentary as much as commercial: to show what Begleri and Fokiano actually taste like when they are grown and vinified with care.

Hand work on granite terraces

Everything at Proespera happens by hand. The terraces are narrow and the boulders are immovable, so pruning, canopy work, weeding and picking are all manual. Harvest dates are set vine by vine according to ripeness rather than by a single sweep through the vineyard.

The result is small crops per plant and fruit with pronounced aroma and flavour, which is the trade the family accepts in exchange for a site that no machine could ever work. Organic cultivation without pesticides adds further labour, particularly in a maritime climate, and it is carried out on the same manual basis.

Why this matters

Vines are cultivated and harvested entirely by hand on terraces machinery cannot reach.
Organic methods are used throughout, with no pesticides in the vineyard.
Only indigenous Ikarian varieties are planted, keeping rare grapes in commercial production.
Yields per plant are deliberately small, favouring concentration over volume.
The whole range comes from one estate at Proespera, so every bottle has a single, traceable origin.

“Tsantiris expresses one Ikarian hillside through native Begleri, Fokiano and Mandilaria, organic cultivation on dry stone terraces, and a vineyard the family has held since 1875.”

A Daily Ritual from Ikaria

Each Tsantiris bottle reflects the way wine sits in Ikarian life, poured at the table with food rather than treated as an occasion in itself. The island’s wine culture is domestic, communal and unhurried, and the wines are built for that setting.

Native Begleri, Fokiano and Mandilaria from one estate at Proespera
Organic cultivation on dry stone terraces at 350 to 450 metres
Hand harvesting, with picking timed to each vine’s ripeness
Clay vessel fermentation with wild yeast in the Vitina bottlings
PGI Ikaria classification on the labels

Tsantiris brings together an island with a viticultural record reaching back to antiquity, three grape varieties largely confined to the eastern Aegean, and a family vineyard that has been in continuous use since the 1870s.

Tsantiris: What Sets Ikarian Wine Apart

Ikaria’s viticulture is defined by what the island will and will not allow. Steep granite slopes, small terraces and strong wind rule out scale, and the varieties that survived here did so because they suited those conditions rather than because anyone chose them for the market.

Quality	Description
Indigenous varieties	Begleri, Fokiano and Mandilaria, known locally as Kountouro, grown almost exclusively in the eastern Aegean and rarely bottled as single estate wines.
Altitude and terrain	Dry stone terraces at 350 to 450 metres, set among granite boulders on slopes exposed to sun and sea wind.
Organic cultivation	Farmed by biological methods without pesticides, with all vineyard work carried out by hand.
Sun drying	Melisanty is made from Fokiano grapes dried in the sun and then matured for twenty four months in oak, a technique of long standing in the Aegean.

Across the range the common thread is texture and minerality: citrus, green apple and wild herb in the whites, wildflower and dark fruit in the reds, and a saline lift that reads as coastal rather than simply fruity.

Daily Use in the Ikarian Kitchen

Ikarian cooking runs on garden vegetables, wild greens, goat, fish, pulses and the island’s own cheese, and the wines were shaped alongside that food. They are table wines in the proper sense, better with a plate in front of them than on their own.

Use	How to Enjoy
Begleri with fish	Served at 8 to 10°C with grilled fish, seafood and fresh white cheese, where its citrus, green apple and herb aromas and mineral acidity come forward.
Akratos with red meat	Matured twelve months in barrel, with red fruit, spice and a velvet texture that stands up to roasted meat and tomato based dishes.
Melisanty at the end	The sun dried sweet Fokiano, with caramel, raisin, dried fig and honey notes, poured in small measures with chocolate or red fruit desserts.

Store bottles on their side somewhere cool and dark, away from vibration and temperature swings. Open whites and rosé chilled, and give the clay fermented reds a little air before pouring.

Sustainable and Ethical Practices at Tsantiris

At Tsantiris, the farming method was decided by the place before it was decided by the family. Terraces of this size, held together by dry stone and interrupted by granite, cannot absorb heavy machinery or intensive inputs, so the estate is worked organically and manually because that is what the hillside will take.

Keeping Begleri, Fokiano and Mandilaria in commercial production matters too. These are varieties with no reach beyond their home islands, and they survive only where a grower is willing to plant them instead of something easier to sell.

Their approach

A vineyard in continuous family use since 1875 has been rebuilt as a working organic estate producing a range of eight wines from three indigenous grapes, all of them from the same terraces at Proespera. Cultivation is biological and free of pesticides, harvest and vineyard work are entirely manual, and yields per plant stay low by design. The winemaking follows the same logic: wild yeast and clay vessels for the Vitina Begleri and Vitina Kountouro, barrel maturation for Akratos, sun drying for Melisanty. Konstantinos Tsantiris and Domina Glarou run the estate with their children Yianni and Nassia, and receive visitors for tours and tastings at the winery between May and October, and by arrangement through the winter.

Learn more Tsantiris Winery

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The Story of Ikaria: Greece's Island of Healthy Ageing

Ikaria lies in the eastern Aegean between Samos and Mykonos, a narrow ridge of granite and schist rising steeply from the sea. It is a hard island to farm and was historically a hard island to reach, which left its villages self sufficient and its agriculture small in scale and local in character.

The island is also linked to Pramnian wine, one of the best known wines of antiquity and named in Homer. Ikaria is one of the small number of places designated a Blue Zone, a demographic classification given to regions with unusually high proportions of long lived residents, and it is a description of the population rather than of anything in a bottle.

Why Ikaria stands out

A traditional Mediterranean way of eating.
Daily use of olive oil, legumes, greens, and seasonal vegetables.
Herbal teas made from mountain plants.
Natural movement through everyday life.
Strong community and family connection.
A slower, lower-stress daily rhythm.

What makes Ikaria especially interesting is that these habits work together. The Blue Zone lifestyle is not based on one product or one rule, but on a wider food culture and way of living shaped over generations.

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Frequently Asked Questions About Tsantiris

What is Tsantiris Winery?

Tsantiris is a small organic winery at Ano Proespera in the north west of Ikaria, in the eastern Aegean. The family vineyard was planted in 1875 and the current winery was founded in 2000 by Konstantinos Tsantiris, a fourth generation winemaker, with his wife Domina Glarou.
Are the wines organic?

The vineyard is cultivated by biological methods without pesticides, and the wines are sold as organic under the PGI Ikaria classification. All cultivation and harvesting is carried out by hand.
What does clay vessel fermentation mean here?

The Vitina Begleri and Vitina Kountouro are fermented and matured in clay containers using wild yeast rather than cultured strains. Clay is porous and gives a slower, less controlled fermentation, which shows in the finished wines as a mineral, earthy texture alongside the fruit.
Where exactly is the vineyard?

On the slopes above Proespera, north west Ikaria, at 350 to 450 metres above sea level. The vines occupy around fifty stremmata, roughly five hectares, on dry stone terraces set between granite boulders.
What does the Begleri taste like?

Bright and golden in the glass, with citrus, green apple and fresh herb aromas, mineral acidity and a saline note that reflects the exposed coastal site. It is served chilled at 8 to 10°C and suits fish, seafood and white cheese.

Explore the Tsantiris Collection

The Tsantiris range covers eight wines from the estate at Proespera: the dry white Begleri, Fokiano Blanc de Noir and Fokiano Rosé, the dry reds Lagiros and Akratos, the clay fermented Vitina Begleri and Vitina Kountouro, and the sun dried sweet Melisanty. It sits within our small-estate Aegean island wine collection, chosen for the same reasons: rare native varieties, organic vineyards, and producers small enough to work every row by hand.

The wines currently listed here are the Dry White Wine Begleri, PGI Ikaria 2023 at 13%, and the Dry Red Wine Vitina Kountouro, PGI Ikaria 2021 at 13%, both in 750ml bottles. Between them they cover the two sides of the estate, the fresh mineral white and the clay fermented red.

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JOURNAL

Know What You’re Tasting

The Journal is where we go deeper into the stories and knowledge behind the collection, so you can understand what makes a product distinctive before it ever reaches the table.

It is a place to understand the details that matter, and the reasons a product earns its place with us.

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Tsantiris: Five Generations of Organic Wine on Ikaria's Granite Terraces