The big day is 17th April!
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (the 7th president of Argentina) is the man to thank. In 1853 he decided it was time to kick the Argentinian wine industry into action! On the 17th April 1853 he submitted a proposal which would put Argentina on the world wine map.
It was that year, 1853, that the Malbec grape was introduced to Argentina. 10 years later the Phylloxera plague started killing off vines all across Europe and the Malbec vines in the Southern Rhone were taking a real battering. Whilst that was happening, the vines in Argentina were adapting to the varied soil types and were starting to produce Malbec wines which were better than those from its homeland of France.
By the 1950s, Argentina was the only country left growing original Malbec vines of French origin. The Malbec wines of France were hard and tannic, and the wine was quite often used for blending – just a small percentage added to other grape varieties to give those wines some tannic structure.
The Malbec wines of Argentina (especially the Mendoza region) are world famous, the wines are fruity, approachable, well balanced and offer a spectrum of styles. From light and fruity to the more serious wines, aged in oak and with much raging potential.
Argentina is now easily the biggest Malbec producer in the world with 76,600 acres of vineyards planted across the country, followed next by France’s 13,100 acres.
So, it’s time to crack open a bottle and raise a glass to the Argentinians for the amazing transformation of this world class grape variety.
You can view our Malbec wines on our website here >
We often show Malbec wines at our wine tasting events, if you fancy a fun evening with your friends or event a get together with your colleagues then we would be happy to tell you all about our wine tasting events, simply get in touch.
