Cypriot wine and where to taste it

Wine is a side of Cyprus I wouldn’t miss. The island has its own grapes, a sweet wine with centuries behind it and mountain villages where wineries open their doors. I go through what the official sources say and where to taste. Everything else worth eating and drinking is in Cypriot food.

The island’s grapes

The clearest figure comes, oddly enough, from a cured meat. The geographical indication paperwork for Pitsilia lountza explains that the meat is marinated in dry red wine made from Mavro, the predominant local variety, covering about 80 % of the area under vines, sometimes with Maratheftiko, another red native to the island. The document for Paphos loukaniko adds that Mavro grown above 500 metres in that district gives its wine its character. One winery in Pissouri, according to Limassol’s tourism board, also experiments with the Soultanina grape.

Commandaria

The flagship wine is a sweet red from the villages of the southern Troodos, made from grapes picked late, dried in the sun and aged in oak. UNESCO inscribed it in 2025 as Intangible Cultural Heritage. It gets a page of its own, Commandaria wine.

Once your dates are set, check which hotels are still free in Omodos before prices climb.

Limassol’s wine villages

Limassol’s tourism board lists around ten wineries you can visit, mostly family-run and in the mountain villages known as the Krasochoria. Omodos has Ktima Gerolemo, founded in 1987, and Linos, with tastings and cellar-door sales. Koilani has Ayia Mavri, and Vasa Koilaniou has Argyrides, on a restored family estate. Pachna has Monolithos, on the Troodos foothills, and Pyrgos its own boutique winery. Further down, near the sea, G. Theophanous works in Pissouri. The opening times are in the table. For some background first, the Cyprus Wine Museum in Erimi opens every day and bills itself as the starting point for these routes.

Each has its own style of visit. Zambartas, a boutique winery focused on native grapes and sustainable vineyard management, starts with an introduction to Cypriot viticulture, moves through the cellar and ends with a tasting. Ktima Gerolemo adds guided tours, masterclasses and brunches, while Argyrides has an Oak Room for private events. Several of these wineries close one or two days a week, so it’s worth planning the order of your stops around the table above rather than turning up on spec.

And in Larnaca

Over in the Larnaca area, its tourism board mentions Ktima Christoudia in Kato Drys, which shows how it makes both wine and soutzoukos, the grape must sweet I cover in Cypriot desserts, and runs harvest days in autumn.

In Paphos district, wine means the Laona plateau, with villages such as Kathikas, and the valley of Pano Panagia, where Chrysorrogiatissa Monastery has its own winery; the village, Pano Panagia, is also Makarios’s birthplace. From Kouklia, the Paphos tourism board also maps the Diarizos Valley wine route, with vineyards lower than those of the Troodos, and I bring its three routes together with Limassol’s in Cyprus wine routes.

If you would rather have a local show you round, book a guided tour in Omodos and choose by the reviews.

How I’d do it

A full day, with tastings booked and someone driving who isn’t drinking. To get around the villages, see car hire in Cyprus; you drive on the left, as at home. To take a bottle home, I’d go for Commandaria, as I explain in souvenirs from Cyprus. The pomace left after the harvest is distilled into zivania, an EU geographical indication since 2008.

And if you’re there at the end of September, the big showcase for Cypriot wine is the Limassol Wine Festival.

A car frees you from timetables: search car hire in Limassol on DiscoverCars and compare companies.

Once your dates are set, check which hotels are still free in Omodos before prices climb.