Tidings Magazine

One visit and you’ll be entranced. A complex and richly compelling country, Argentina defies easy analysis. Wine, though, plays a huge role in defining the nation’s culture.

Only recently overtaken by the United States, Argentina stood as the fifth largest wine producer in the world — imagine that. And the wines were rarely seen outside the country. The main reason for this is that Argentines just drank it all themselves. Buenos Aires, which translates as “good winds,” numbers some twelve million inhabitants — known to the rest of their countrymen as Porteños, meaning “from the port” — and they’re all clearly thirsty.

The culture of the city and most of southern Argentina is almost entirely European, with Spanish and Italian immigrants everywhere. And these ordinary folk brought the vines of their homelands with them. Far more than anywhere in the New World, wine became the everyday beverage of the people. Local wines were consumed in copious quantities and for the most part, quality took second place to quantity.

My first destination, though, lay further afield.

Up on high

Cafayate, in the remote and breathtaking Calchaquí Valleys, is about 800 miles northwest of Buenos Aires, close to the borders with Bolivia and Paraguay. From historic Salta City, the drive to Cafayate covers 100 miles or so through a winding, increasingly stark landscape reminiscent of Colorado or Arizona. As the green valleys all around unfold, you get the unreal sense of having arrived in another world.

Here, surrounded by vineyards some 1,700 metres above sea level, is the beautiful Spanish colonial Bodega El Esteco, a winery and hotel/wine spa owned by Michel Torino. The unique location boasts nearly 340 days of sunshine per year. The high altitude and dry atmosphere is extremely healthy and the usual vineyard pests and diseases are almost non-existent. Days are very hot and sunny, and temperatures cool off rapidly at night. This combination produces remarkably ripe fruit, which is also vibrantly fresh. The unique qualities of this remote region have attracted the likes of celebrated French oenologist Michel Rolland and Donald Hess, of California fame, both of whom have established wineries here.

During my visit in early March, harvesting was underway at Michel Torino’s certified-organic vineyard. The grapes are picked by hand, and rigorous organic standards carry through from harvesting through vinification and aging. The vineyard itself is much less manicured than the rest of the estate. This is part of the organic design. The wines from this vineyard are also made in a natural style, which helps retain a certain rustic character. Most of Cafayate’s vineyards are now switching to drip irrigation, which conserves water and provides better control over vine growth. The organic vineyard, though, continues to use the ancient “flood” system. Water comes through irrigation channels from the nearby mountains, a technique that dates back to the Incas.

Alejandro Nesman, the assistant winemaker at El Esteco, guided me through a tasting of barrel samples. Most interesting were the reds, which had been in the barrel for some time. I could glimpse the wave of the future for Argentine wines. Bonarda, a widely planted grape in Argentina, has so far largely been used for blending or to produce easy-drinking, fruity young wines. As the 2005 barrel sample clearly showed, it is now being treated more seriously and obviously has great potential. The 2005 will be included in the top Torino blend, Altimus, but it should also, I hope, be bottled as a single varietal. Even more impressive was the 2005 Tannat. More austere than the attractively fruity Bonarda and very tannic, it had great structure, powerful fruit and long ageability. The 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon, which had been in the barrel for only three months, showed plenty of elegant fruit and excellent varietal character. All this bodes well for the potential of Cafayate.