Kechris Winery – Tear of the Pine 2022

Few wines have brought as much attention to the Retsina category in recent years as this one: at the Decanter World Wine Awards 2024, the Kechris "Tear of the Pine" scored 97 points and was named "Best in Show" – the first Retsina ever to reach that pinnacle (50 out of 18,143 wines). That such an accolade should fall to a wine that sells over the counter in Germany for around 17 euros is really something. And naturally one then wonders: was it down to the wine itself, or was it simply a case of "Retsina's turn"? The obvious hypothesis is that the Decanter jury was caught off guard because they simply weren't familiar with a Retsina based on Assyrtiko and would have expected Savatiano as the base variety – here it's 100% Assyrtiko in the bottle.

"Tear of the Pine," the tear of the pine tree, belongs to the Retsina "Appellation by Tradition" and thus is not classified as PDO. There's a curious reason for this – the grapes come from Goumenissa in Kilkis, but the PDO Goumenissa is a red appellation for Xinomavro and Negoska, which is why a white Assyrtiko Retsina is necessarily listed as a traditional Retsina style. The code "LN22" on the label is likewise not a classic vintage but a release code, because Retsina is legally not labelled with a conventional vintage. What's meant is the 2022 harvest year, picked on September 1. Kechris, a family winery from Thessaloniki with roots reaching back to 1911 and a cellar in Kalochori since 1954, has under Stelios Kechris (Dijon oenology) and his daughters Eleni, Maria and Zoe driven precisely this rehabilitation of Retsina – away from the taverna and tourist cliché. The first "Tear of the Pine" dates from 2005/2006. The style is deliberately conceived as winey: cold maceration, fermentation in oak barrels of various origins with resin added during fermentation at around 15°C – warmer than usual – followed by six months on the fine lees with bâtonnage. The Aleppo pine resin is thus an aromatic-structural element here, like wood, not a preservative. The figures: 13.5% alcohol, 6.80 g/l acidity, 3.7 g/l residual sugar.

I tasted the 2022 on the same day directly alongside the 2024, and this vertical comparison is decisive for my assessment. On the nose the 2022 shows the resin in a multi-layered way, dominant towards the back, but beneath it also sweet blossoms. On the palate the Assyrtiko announces itself with good acidity, yet aromatically it has rather little to contribute. The finish is good – what's nice is that there the Assyrtiko is first allowed to dominate, and in a second finish the resin makes itself heard once more. But it's above all the acidity that sets the tone. For someone who has tasted many Assyrtiko Retsinas, this is not a surprisingly stunning wine but a very decent Retsina. I miss a bit of texture, a bit of creaminess, a bit of fruit – alongside acidity and resin the wine threatens to tip into the watery. That sounds harsh, but for exactly that reason one should place my tasting of the 2024 beside it: that one reaches 93 points with me and at the moment is clearly ahead of the legendary 2022.

With my 91 points I thus stand below the broad consensus: Peter Moser gave the 2022 a 93 in Falstaff, Pavlos Gegas saw it at 92–93(+) with a window from 2026 to 2033, and Decanter, of course, that 97. I share the reticence with Julia Harding MW, who tastes for JancisRobinson.com and gave this very vintage the lowest of her ratings between 2018 and 2025 (she did not taste 2019 and 2021). I see myself in that line. Saying "only" 91 is actually nonsense, though, at a price of under 20 euros: a Best-in-Show wine for 15 to 18 euros remains a price paradox, and I find the 91 very fair for this wine – the price is all the more so for this rating.

91 points.