For this week’s winesday, we are heading way down south to Argentina. I was looking through my past winesday entries, and I realized that I had yet to showcase a wine from Argentina, or any South American country for that matter. I’ve done wines from France, Greece, New Zealand, Austria, even South Africa but never Argentina. Argentina is actually the 5th largest producer of wine in the world so I’d say this winesday was long overdue!
Although Argentina has been making wine since the 1600s, its wine industry is just now starting to get some recognition. The main reason for this is that, up until recently, most of the wine produced in Argentina simply wasn’t very good. It was made from inferior, uninteresting grapes and most of it never left the country. In the 1990s, as internal demand for wine declined, many wineries in Argentina started looking to export more of their wine. However, in order to have a successful export business, improvements in the quality of the wine needed to be made. Many of Argentina’s wineries outfitted themselves with modern technology and began replacing the old, inferior vines with better varietals. As a result, wines from Argentina are now good and will only continue to improve.
Argentina produces its fair share of Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay, but its top wine, arguably, is Malbec. Before Argentina popularized this grape, Malbec was primarily known for being one of the grapes used in blending Bordeaux wines. Now, because Malbec really thrives in Argentina, it gets to shine all on its own. To me, this makes Argentina a very exciting wine region. It’s one thing to make a really good Merlot or Chardonnay. But, to have your own signature grape that no other region is growing in any significant quantity? That’s pretty cool in my opinion.
Malbec is a very dark grape. Not surprisingly, it produces wines that tend to be very rich and full of dark fruit. Malbec wines are juicy and jammy and have plenty of soft tannins. Like most red wines, they go well with meat (particularly Argentina’s beloved beef!) However, because of their fruity character, Malbecs are said to be a good match for a wide range of foods including fish dishes and Mexican or Indian food.
My Malbec of choice for this winesday was Enrique Foster 2006 Ique Malbec. The sign at the wine shop described this as having all of the characteristics of an Argentinian Malbec so I figured I couldn’t go wrong there. For dinner, I decided to make Orecchiette with Baby Turnips and their Greens with spicy Italian sausages on the side. I picked up some baby turnips at the farmer’s market last weekend, and this seemed like the perfect way to use them. I love anything on orecchiette pasta. Orecchiette means “little ears” but they look more like little suction cups to me. At one point during the meal, I looked down at my plate and there was a pea-sized turnip perfectly nestled inside one of the orecchiette cups. It made me so happy (I get a big kick out of silly little things like that.)
The Ique Malbec was dark purple in color (and your teeth will be too after a few sips!) As I expected, both from knowing the typical characteristics of Malbec beforehand and just from looking at the dark color of the wine itself, the flavor was rich and deep. It tasted fruity, but more like dark, dried fruit than fresh fruit; somewhere between plums and prunes. It went well with the food but would also be great as a sipping wine on its own. Two thumbs up for this Malbec!