Forbes: Paul Hobbs is known as the Steve Jobs in the wine world. This article on him from Forbes explains his critical role in introducing Argentine wine to the world. We like him.

Steve Jobs made IPhones, Paul Hobbs makes wine

I only see a small percentage of what’s going on out there, but from what I do see, there is there is a lot of development within Argentina and Eastern Europe. There are many regions that have been forgotten with time that we are seeing in a new light.

The Globe and Mail: Malbec is Argentina’s poster child when it comes to Argentine wine. You know this, I know this. It’s old news. However – what’s going to be the next big wine to come out of Argentina- maybe bonarda, torrontes, a nice cabernet sauvignon? This article gives you the low down on the best new wines from Mendoza.

Move over malbec, these varietals are starting to turn heads

Is there another ace up the gaucho’s sleeve? Some people say it’s bonarda, the country’s other signature red, which ranks just behind malbec in production volume.

Good Food: Wine etiquette sometimes throw you through a loop? This article should help the next time you’ve paid the bill at the restaurant and there’s still wine on the table.

To take home, or not to take home, that is the question.

We were the last to leave a dinner with friends and three bottles of wine were on the table still half full. One was a shiraz we brought with us, which is a favourite of mine. I asked the host if he planned to drink it and he invited me to take it home. In the car, my wife said she was embarrassed. What do you think?

Gizmodo: A cork is a cork right? Cork manufacturer Amorim says no and has invented a spiral cork that will catch your eye. But does it make a difference?

Will corks ever be the same?

…the threaded design of the Helix creates its own tight seal, meaning oxygen can’t escape on the sides while the density of the stopper prevents oxygen from escaping through the cork itself.

Wine Spectator: How expensive are Napa Valley wines these days? Very expensive, says Matt Kramer, from Wine Spectator.

Every year, simply by calling attention to itself, Auction Napa Valley triggers a spasm of wildfire wine-populist outrage over the “insanely high” prices of Napa Valley wines, especially the Cabernets.

I have always been interested in the wines of Bodega Antucura ever since discovering their Malbec while hosting a Buenos Aires wine tour so I was keen to get a look at their production. Unfortunately Antucura winery was closed to the public during our Mendoza visit but as it turned out Brigitte from Carinae is close friends with the owner Anne Caroline Biancheri and the head winemaker, as they are all French, so she wangled a private viewing for me. Yes, the French winemakers in Argentina all stick together, in fact I even found a fabulous book by Editorial Antucura called ‘Vinos Argentinos con Acento Frances‘ that features many of those wonderful Argentine-French wineries to prove it.

The winery is based in an area that is considered the heart of Valley de Uco; Vista Flores, Tunuyan, hidden amongst some of the most breathtaking views of the foothills of the Andes I have ever had the pleasure to set my eyes on…’hidden’ is actually the operative word in this sentence. Arriving at Bodega Antucura was no easy chore so be sure to book a reliable driver when you reserve a Mendoza wine tour! I’m a poet and I didn’t even know it! Ha! Enough of that tomfoolery.

We arrived at Antucura just in time to see the press process for a Malbec. The press is where the grape pomace (the broken down grape skins, pulp, seeds and any stems) is pressed at the end of the fermentation and post-fermentation maceration to release more wine. This press wine is usually high in tannin and dark in colour and therefore is sometimes only added in smaller portions to the original wine as it can be astringent and bitter. The head groundsman, Martin, kindly walked us through each stage while making it very clear that Antucura does NOT use any press wine for their wine production, only the high quality natural gravity wine is used for Antucura lines and the rest is sold off to mass producing wineries. All the same it was a fascinating process.

The mounds of withered red Malbec grape skins, otherwise known as the cap pomace, were scraped out of the the stainless steel tanks into a bucket that funnelled them into a traditional vertical press, a cylindrical basket made with wooden or metal slats. A removable hydraulic lid was then placed on top which is used to apply pressure, pressing the contents against the stationary plate at the bottom. The liquid that seeped out between the slats was collected at the bottom of the ‘basket’, draining away to a vat.

This traditional method gives fairly clear must or wine and is easy to use so is still popular with many wineries but the process is slow and labour-intensive as well as risking the pressed wine to oxidation as it is exposed to oxygen for longer periods of time, so some wineries (like Familia Blanco) might consider modern machinery such as the pneumatic press for this process.

At the end of the process the impressive cylindrical mound of remaining dry grape skins are piled onto a tractor to be taken to the field to be used as organic material to fertilize the soil, improving soil activity, nutrients and aeration for the vines to reach maximum health for the following vintage.

If watching grapes being pressed within an inch of their life doesn’t do it for you but you are yearning for a bit of tranquility, nature and luxury then Antucura can still cater for your Mendoza vacation needs with the beautiful Casa Antucura Hotel. Check it out here. Just dreamy….I’ll meet you by the pool!

During my recent Mendoza wine tour, I was on a mission, a mission to drink as much of the best Mendoza wine as possible. While Mendoza wineries look fairly close on the map you would be mistaken, Mendoza is, in reality a very large province. Driving to some beautiful high altitude Mendoza wineries in Tunyuan in Valley de Uco will take you no less than 3 hours from Mendoza city (and that’s if you don’t get lost). Over Mendoza’s most prestigious winemaking sub-regions Maipu, Lujan de Cuyo and Valley de Uco, San Rafael and San Martin you can find 1000 odd wineries spread out over 148.827 Km2 of stunning scenic Argentina wine route. It takes a while to get from one to the other….meaning I loose out on drinking and Argentina wine tasting time!

What do you do in this case? Yes, you guessed it, go to a Mendoza wine tasting! You might think that I would be wine tasted out considering that I host many of our Buenos Aires wine tastings but you would be wrong. I am always thirsty for more.
In Mendoza city, Senor Rico and I stumbled into The Vines of Mendoza tasting room for one of their Mendoza wine tasting experiences. Founded in 2004, the company actually specialises in private vineyard estates, where the rich and the famous AND the average Joe wine lover can buy up beautiful 3 to 10 acre plots of professionally managed Mendoza wine country, giving them a fabulous opportunity to try their dab hand at being a winemaker. On top of that, the Vines of Mendoza are also opening up a luxurious new hotel and spa in Valley de Uco where the oenophiles of the world can be in their seventh heaven, surrounded by some of the best vineyards in Argentina while sipping on a glass of The Vines very own Recuerdo estate produced wines and nibbling on some delicious grub from Argentine celebrity chef Francis Mallmanns Siete Fuegos Asado restaurant. I’ll beat you there!

The man himself Francis Mallmann

At The Vines wine tasting you have the option to choose from several of their ‘flights’, which can suit a variety of tastes and budgets, with their exclusive high-end wine tasting costing a whooping $600AR pesos (only 5 tasting wines, no food). Ouch! Senor Rico and I settled on the classic line up that showed ‘signature samples of the regional varitals’. They had an interesting line up…but no 100% Malbec?? Argentina wine tasting and no Malbec? I know there are lots of exciting wines out there in the foothills of the Andes but in a signature regional varietals selection you would hope to have at least one Malbec in there. They did a offer other Malbec wine tastings but the option for more than one ‘flight’, burns rather a large whole in one’s pocket.

Here are my results of the signature sampling range:

1. Recuerdo Torrontes 2012 from Tunuyan, Valle de Uco, Mendoza. 100% Torrontes (the Vines of Mendoza own private estate production)

Light lemony green, indicating a healthy, youthful wine, with overwhelming honey notes and floral essence. On the palate, it was well pronounced in it fruity peach characteristics with a strong lick of minerality and lemon on the finish. Slightly flabby acidity for my tastes, as I like the light zing of a lighter refreshing style of Torrontes but well balanced alcohol.

2. Caelum Rose 2012 from Agrelo, Lujan de Cuyo, Mendoza. 50% Malbec, 50% Cabernet Sauvignon. 2,000 bottle production.

Interesting rose blend and with only minute of contact between the skins and the must giving this an intriguing look. And that is where it unfortunately ended for me. I really wanted to like it but… colour: pale, water pink. Aroma: Light rose petals. Ephemeral. Palate: Refreshing acidity, slight hint of lemon and rosemary. I like my wine to be slightly more loud and proud so this didn’t really do it for me but I met a young lady later that night that was in love with Caelum Rose. Possibly cliche but in amy opinion this is a rose well suited to younger wine drinkers or feminine tastes.

3. Miras Pinot Noir 2010 from General Roca, Rio Negro. 100% Pinot Noir. 15 months in American and French oak and 6 months in bottle before release.

A light brick red with and interesting and expressing nose of violets and juicy raspberries and fresh red fruits. The alcohol was a little too warm in the mouth but the sweet cherry entrance followed by a long nutty finish won me over.

4. Oenus Merlot 2011 from Lujan de Cuyo, Mendoza. 100% Merlot. ‘Garage’ wine production from winemaker Gonzalo Mazzotta

A deep blood red, with sweet strawberry bubble gum note, tart cherries and boiled sweets. The same sweet/sour theme continued on the palate with structured tannins, medium acidity and a punchy finish of orange.

5. Earth First Reserva Blend 2009 from Ugarteche, Lujan de Cuyo, Mendoza. 55% Malbec, 45% Bonarda. From winemaker Karim Mussi

A black pit of velvet purple, with a captivating intense nose, smacking of leather, cumin and plum. The mouth lacked some of the flavour where the aroma had been so forthcoming. Light wood and cedar flavours some cherry, with soft and supple tannins. This was my favourite of the Argentina wine tasting.

While I felt it was a slightly overpriced for the experience (cheese plates were available but no food was included in the flights) The Vines of Mendoza is a nice experience for anyone looking to get to know a little more about the wines of Argentina from the helpful staff before heading out to Mendoza’s real wine country.

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In case you have never heard of Salta, or Argentin wine regions in general, you have to think of one of the most desolate places on earth, straight out of a post-apocalyptic Mad Max film, and then add gorgeous vineyards and wineries. The land when driving outside of the agricultural zones is truly brutal, with precipitation at nearly zero and altitude at a sky scraping 6000 to 10,000 feet above sea level (and that is for where the vineyards are planted!), this is one of the most unique terroir on earth for growing wine grapes.

Salta is known for Torrontes, the uber aromatic “liar’s grape” (because it is sweet in the nose yet dry in the mouth), but its red wines are becoming known as eccentric, interesting and cool. Enter Amalaya Gran Corte which is a blend of 85% Malbec and 15% of Cabernet Franc and Tannat (they do not specify how much of each of the latter varietals).

Now Malbec from Salta, for me at least (and let’s remember that wine is super subjective!), can come across as quite medicinal, herbal, or cough syrup-y. Yes, not that pleasant in my opinion, but that’s what you get from a terroir that is so vastly different from the norm. Some special wineries in Salta, though, manage to get this caramelized, earthy, jolly-rancher effect coupled with a firm tannin and in this case, interesting spicy complexity from the blended varietals. Now again, this wine is not for everyone, but will certainly not be found in many wine tastings in Buenos Aires, as it is eclectic, unique and not inexpensive.

If you are looking for something new and different on your wine journey, I can highly suggest it with beef, pork or lamb.

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Anna Bistro

On my Mendoza wine tour I was a massive fatty. I ate everything in sight and then some. One of the highlights of my greedy guts Mendoza food tour was Anna Bistro, a beautiful French bistro recommended to us by Philippe and Brigitte from Carinae, who are of course also French so no surprises that this is one of their favourite restaurants in Mendoza city. Oddly enough we were told that many Mendocinos consider Anna Bistro ‘too far out’ to recommend to tourists, but it is literally only 4 blocks from the central avenues Sarmiento and Belgrano. I have a feeling that they want to keep this restaurant free for just the locals to enjoy!

Dim lighting, nude brick walls, fine art; yes I was happy in Anna Bistro, even happier when I saw the menus, wine and food alike. The food was outstanding; Argentine food with a French accent, slightly less salt, a touch more refined combined with wow factor presentation. A word of advice, if the waiter says you can share a dish, you probably could but its best not to, you’ll want to eat the whole thing to yourself! Senor Rico and I shared mollejas (sweetbread) bruscuetta with sundried tomatoes and we were literally fighting each other for the last piece, much to the annoyance of our dinning neighbours. For the main I ordered a chicken roulade with blue cheese drizzled with a shallot and Malbec jus. Flavourful, simple, moist and just oh so right…all I needed was a great wine.

Ernesto with his biodynamic grapes

For one reason or another I have a strange fixation with Ernest Catena Vineyards and the man himself, so when I perused the wonderfully extensive wine menu at Anna Bistro, I was overawed and excited by the choice but was inexplicably drawn to Ernesto Catena’s certified organic line Tikal Malbec Reserva, which is set to reach new biodynamic status for the 2013 vintage.

If these viticultural methods sound like Chinese I’ll explain some basics; Organic viticulture focuses on the prevention of pest and disease rather than the cure by using key environmentally conscious techniques which aim to coexist with the environment by enhancing biological cycles, maintaining ecological diversity and minimising damage to the environment with the use of crop rotation, rational use of manure and vegetable waste as well as the use of appropriate cultivation technique rather than relying on toxic agrochemicals whereas Biodynamic viticulture is a little more difficult to grasp.

Biodynamics aims to work with the viticulturists personal relationship with the environment in a spiritual sense rather than a practical approach, by use of holistic, cosmic forces and energies (seasons and moon cycles) and harmony that will allow plants to defend themselves against pest and diseases for example using only ‘fruit days’ in the luna calendar are best for applying treatments (like horn silica) to produce quality fruit and dynamited ash of predators (rabbits/insects) may be sprayed onto the foliage to naturally control pest. A bit hokey pokey maybe but the truth is all in the bottle!

Tikal Malbec Reserva 2010 is made from 100% organic Malbec, grown at an elevation of 3215 feet in Tunuyan, Valley de Uco, with the average age of the vines is at approximately 12 years. It spent 12 months in oak, mostly second-use French oak, with a small portion of American oak producing just over 3200 cases. Argentina organic wines had yet to impress me, the majority taste like tank wine to me but Tikal Malbec Reserve received 91 points by Robert Parker so maybe it would change my mind.

Its tenebrous depth of Tikal was exciting and mysterious; a black, inky intensity. It was as if the colour was somehow describing the aroma; animalistic leather notes, mixed with juicy blackberries and plum, with a lingering cinnamon and violets after a few minutes of air. Woah! The taste test: it was surprisingly soft, with a medium full body (I thought this would be all power intense all the way), with a sweet fruit forward entrance, and a flicking of flint at the back of the throat, a flavor which lasted for at least 2 minutes before fading into the background. The tannin , alcohol (14.2%) and acidity were all wonderfully balanced. The conclusion; I guess some of the best wines of Argentina are organic!

Wine Spectator: The 2013 southern hemisphere wine harvest is complete! This article has a couple experts from the Wine Spectator weigh in on this year’s batch of grapes from Argentina and Chile. We’re excited with the results here in Buenos Aires.

Southern Hemisphere harvest in Argentina.

Much needed spring rains and an absence of a major frost led to a good fruit set as Argentine winemakers reported normal to 25 percent higher yields.

India.com: This beauty article shows wine isn’t just for drinking. Wine facials are the new cool thing to do in the world of personal beauty. While they say that the wine facial gives you an instant glow, I prefer the gradual and much warmer glow that I get after  3 or 4 glasses.

Wine facial popularity is growing in the beauty world.

We’ve had mud slung at us and eggs on our faces all in the name of rejuvenating facials. Here’s another one coming at you: wine facials. You can understand the splash of luxury in the Bordeaux district of France, but is wine really that fine on your face in a tropical country like India?

taste.com.au: Ok, we all love wine. But do those adjective rich descriptions of every varietal you see on the shelf really help in choosing a bottle? This article about wine lingo will hopefully help you in the future!

Wine lingo for the wine enthusiast.

A couple of new buzzwords have entered the back label wine description lexicon – “savoury” and “spicy”. It’s worth exploring what they mean.

Daily Mercury: Want to track how many glasses of wine you’ve been drinking since you arrived at that dinner party? There’s an app for that.

Participants try out the new app to see how many glasses of wine they’re actually consuming.

A new smart phone application called The Wine Line was launched last week by Jacob’s Creek. It allows wine lovers to calculate the number of standard drinks in their glass of white, red or bubbly by taking a photo of it and tracing the fill level on the phone’s screen.

Bloomberg: This chinese restaurant in New York could have you spending more than anticipated if you’re a wine lover. The extensive wine list has some big names and some that could have your reaching a little deeper into your wallet – $12,000 deeper.

Over 1,800 bottles are stocked in their cellar, which by the way, looks like something out of James Bond.

We’ve finished this week’s round up of wine news and we hope everyone’s enjoyed the ride.  Tune in next week for more!

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In Salta though, at this tremendous altitude, you have extremely unique conditions: tropical strength sunshine which means that with enough irrigation, wine grapes can thrive here. In fact, this is *the* region for Torrontes because Torrontes requires special conditions to make great wine grapes, specifically abundant sunshine, but temperatures low enough that allow it to retain acidity. The cool nights that you get with altitude provide just this.

Malbec also does very well in this region, but takes on very different characteristics than its Mendoza Malbec cousin. Typically I would describe the general difference as a more earthy, tannic and perhaps licorice scented and flavored wine versus the super concentrates dark fruits and cloves that one finds in nearly all Malbec from Mendoza.

When we did a wine tasting in Buenos Aires, here at our tasting room in Palermo Soho, the Laborum Malbec made quite an impact. It has power, length and great complexity. It also has one of the most distinctly caramel aromas I have ever perceived in a wine. Besides this aroma you get undertones of earth and soil with just a bit of medicinal herbs. In the mouth there is good dark fruit but this is more subtle as earthy and savory notes come through more.

This is a fantastic Malbec from Salta and a classic example of the great wines that can be produced in that region. It is exceptionally rare to see the El Porvenir wines (their other brands include the Amauta, which has some very interesting blends as well as Tannat and single vineyard Torrontes) at any wine tastings in Buenos Aires as the El Porvenir winery makes very limited productions.

I highly recommend this wine for someone looking for a unique Malbec that has excellent quality. It is certainly not for everyone, especially young drinkers who are just starting out.

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Beautiful Vina Las Perdices Winery

Next up on my Mendoza wine tour was Vina Las Perdices. It’s no secret that I am a big fan of Las Perdices, I have been pretty much shouting it from the mountain tops for at least two years now, ever since the moment I discovered their Bonarda Reserve in a quirky Palermo Hollywood restaurant. Working in our Buenos Aires wine tasting room allowed me to try a whole range of their best Argentina wines and they have never failed to impress me….which is really quite rare. So no surprises here; I was thrilled to get in on a bit of behind the scene wine making action.

Las Perdices Vineyards and hail net protection

Vina Las Perdices is based in the midst of world wide acclaimed Argentine wineries such as Vina Cobos (Paul Hobbs winery) and Bodega Septima in Agrelo, Lujan de Cuyo, Mendoza. The long windy (and dusty) road that led us to the impressive facade of the winery was flanked by what appeared to be miles and miles of neatly trellised bare vines covered in netting, a relatively new method to protect the vines from one of Mendoza’s greats natural hazards: firece hailstorms. Hail can literally devastate large section of vineyards, greatly reducing yield, quality and therefore production. Ice rocks the size of my head, strip the vines of leaves, stems and berries, while any broken ‘surviors’ automatically have an increased threat of rot and disease due to open wounds. The nets have proven to greatly reduce the impact of the hail but is not 100% effective. In fact there aren’t any method which are, including explosive rockets that are fired into thunderclouds, seeding the clouds with silver iodine to instigate rainfall rather than hail or towers charged with static electricity may be placed near susceptible vineyards to try and divert the storm. Plus there is a downside of to the two latter methods: price!

Carlos Munoz pruning Tannat vines

Carlos Munoz, the chief winemaker/owner of Las Perdices met us at the entrance and there began our extensive Mendoza wine tour. Carlos, a exceptionally kind, gracious and clearly passionate man explained everything in beautiful detail. The vineyards of Las Perdices are maintained to impeccable standards using the latest technology like drip irrigation and inter row ground cover to add to the natural biodiversity, improving soil structure, while naturally increasing/encouraging soil life. Carlos walked us through the spur pruning methods, shoot positioning and trimming that they apply in Las Perdices, to obtain a balanced vine and therefore high quality fruit which is all neatly positioned an accessible and well aerated fruiting zone.

Punching down the cap

Inside the winery itself, I was a kid in a sweet in a sweet shop. The large stainless steel tanks and rows of barrels made it appear like a setting that had been used in a scene in Blade Runner but in those stainless steel tanks lay precious fermenting berries and must….the first stages of wine!! Carlos walked us up a flight of stairs that so we could get a better look at what was going on inside the tanks. The lid was popped on a white wine production tank containing only the must and I was overwhelmed by the aromas of sweet floral fruit that filled the air, there was no doubt that this was a La Perdices Torrontes in the making. The red wines tanks were opened to reveal the cap of berries floating on the surface, and a intense yeast and red fruit aroma. We had arrived just in time, the cap need punching down, a gentle process which involves pushing the pomace cap down into the fermenting must using a large stainless steel paddle. Senor Rico gladly volunteered for the job at hand….and failed miserably. The cap was as solid as concrete and it was only after Carlos made some head way that we could see the cracks in the surface and a release of gas from the fermentation process escaped the tank.

Tank tasting at Las Perdices Winery

Tank wine tasting was of course, the highlight of my Las Perdices experience. We started with a Tannat, typically a late ripening varietal so was only at the beginning of its fermentation process. The juice that trickled down from the tap was the palest rose water colour, with just a hit of fruit and very sweet as the sugars were still just that rather than nice warming alcohol. Next we tasted my old friend Bonarda, that was mid process but had already developed a velvety deep purple colour, with incredible red cherry and cranberry aromas and just a just a touch of sweetness. Finally, one of the earliest ripening grapes is the red wine of Argentina Malbec and there it was in its tank with a matter of hours to o before its completion. Yes, this was wine that I know and love, plum and spices with the comforting warmth of alcohol tickling the back of my throat but just a little bit more rough around the edges, a touch more like grape juice rather than a fine Argentine wine. With a few months (or years) in lightly toasted French oak barrels and bottle these wines will be sitting pretty on our shelves here at Anuva Wines and I for one will be very proud to serve them!

Wine Barrels at Las Perdices

BBC News: The big story in the wine world is definitely China’s reaction to the EU’s decision to increase tariffs on Chinese solar panels. China’s reaction – raise tariffs on French wine. France isn’t happy.

China’s anti-dumping probe has affected France, let’s see if this tariff will be extended to other states as well.

Speaking to the BBC, wine consultant John Warontshak said that the move was “partly symbolic”, but that the imposition of a tariff on imports would have an impact on French producers in particular.

“France is by far the biggest exporter to China. Most of that Bordeaux red,” he explained.

 IGN: For all you lovers of Star Trek and wine. Christmas came early! This company’s made Star Trek wine for you to enjoy.

Star Trek wine is blasting off and can be teleported to your door.

“It is a special blend of Merlot, Sangiovese, Cabernet Franc, Dolcetto, Tinta Cao, and Tempranillo. The blend comes together to create a medium-bodied, easy drinking red wine that is full of depth and character.”

The Daily Meal: It’s getting hot and white wines are the way to go. Torrontés, Argentina’s favorite white wine could become one of your favorites as well. Treat this article as a Torrontés 101 for your wine studies.

Torrontés most closely resembles viognier, boasting citrus and floral notes, yet it’s fresh and crisp. It’s dry with a just enough body to pair with a cheese like Manchego or Petite Basque. Torrontés goes well with a green or herb salad or seafood, but it’s also great with spicy ethnic food like Indian and Thai.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: St. Lous is talking Malbec. Everyone knows that this is one of our favorite topics of conversation. This article talks about the complext flavors and aromas this wine has from Argentina. What’s not to like?

Malbec grapes grown in Argentina can produce delicious medium- to full-bodied reds with complex flavors of black and red fruit, black-pepper spice, smooth, ripe tannins and a bit of earthiness.

Fox News: Spirit airlines inflight service will now offer wine – out of cans. This will help the airline save on storage space and fuel.

Spirit Airlines will be serving wine out of the can.

Spirit likes the cans because they are easier to stack and store on airplanes with limited storage space. They also weigh less and airlines are obsessed with making their planes lighter to save on fuel.

We hope you enjoyed this week’s wine news. All of this talk about Torrontés and Malbec has me itching for a glass. Cheers and enjoy the evening!

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Mevi Boutique is on the tourism cycling route in Maipu, just a stones throw from Carinae but by the time we arrived at winery the sun was was on it’s way out and our stomachs had been stretch beyond their means, culminating in some rather heavy eyelids and an overwhelming need for siesta (nap time which, by the way, is almost compulsory in Mendoza! My kind of city). Mevi was the perfect setting for a relaxing afternoon, surrounded by so much natural beauty it would be impossible to let the eyelids droop any further. Their impeccable Malbec vines (they even grow Malbec grapes to sell to important Argentine wineries such as Familia Toso) and a smattering of Cabernet Sauvignon envelop the modern winery.

Our host, Gino walked us through the vineyards, explaining the life of the vine, the method of spur pruning, giving us a little demonstration while we were at it. I spied a lonely Malbec grape that had been left behind after harvest a month or so ago so I popped it straight into my mouth. It was pure sugar….great for a late harvest wine! I smiled at Senor Rico. In turn, he looked at me with disgust. “Your teeth are purple!!” I shut my mouth. Turns out that, while the skins of Malbec are relatively thin they are also intensely coloured and have the ability to stain very easily. Just look to your next glass of great Argentinean Malbec, most likely it will be a shade of vibrant royal purple, ripe and ready to give all Malbec lovers that delightful and oh so sexy wine mouth smile!

Out of the fields and into the magic rooms, otherwise known as the winery. The stainless steel fermentation vats, barrels and mixing laboratory are all housed in the underbelly of the modern, clean winery, and above which lies the restaurant, accompanied by a balcony with soft inviting sofas and a view to die for and of course the tasting room. Gino lead us through the winery explaining each step of the process, going from the careful pre-selection of final grapes that will be used for the production of Mevi’s wine, the high tech stainless steel tanks that control the temperature for fermentation to obtain just right levels of flavour components, alcohol, colour and phenolic acids that characterise Mevi’s wines. The stainless steel tanks also have the ability to automatically pump over.

Pumping over? What? So basically, during the fermentation process, the grape berries rise to the top of the tank, limiting the contact between the skins and the must. This mass is usually referred to as the pomace cap, and is where the temperature is highest. In order to increase the level of contact, and therefore the level of extraction (yes, the red colour in wine comes form the skins of the grape…hence the purple teeth comment above!), the winemaker must aerate the must and disperse the temperature. Pumping over or remontage (the fancy name) involves draining the the fermenting must from a valve at the bottom of the tank and dispersing it over the the surface of the pomace cap. This action breaks up the cap, extracting tannins and colour compounds during the process, which will last a number of days or weeks, depending on the style of the wine that the winemaker hopes to produce.
After all this wine making talk we were getting a little thirsty, so we were lead up to the perfect Medonza wine tasting room to sink into the sofas and have a complete line up of Mevi’s lovely creations. Of course, I know most of their wine quite intimately already, so I excited to get to know their Rose, which I have not had the pleasure of meeting yet.

Mevi Barrica del Plata Malbec Rose 2011, comes from the very Maipu vineyards which we had pounded, but with only a matter of hours of contact between the must and the skins rather than days or weeks giving the the wine its light salmon pink colour. It was a classic refreshing Rose with summer red fruits shining through, strawberries, raspberries and cream but there was something intriguing hanging in on the back, I couldn’t put my finger on it until I tasted it. It was ever so slightly smokey. The smoke brought in a great characteristic to the wine, that when matched alongside its high acidity makes it ideal for oily, smoked fish like salmon. Tasty but Senor Rico was is a red wine man so stuck with what he knows best and hogged a big glass of delicious San Gimignano Malbec Roble to himself.

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