The Auswine Forum

Any love for Chilean or Argentinean wines here? I have seen a few cheapies around under $20 and wondered if there are better quality wines from this region. Cabernet Sav seems to be popular as is Carmenere and they mostly blend similar to a Bordeaux. Any recommendations?

I am a fan of Malbec from this part of the world. Over the last 5 or so years I have had quite a number of high quality Malbecs from Argentina and Chile (mostly due to the fact that I have a relative that has done some wine buying for an overseas Cruise line by visiting the regions). She has developed a love of Malbec and brought back a number of wines over the years. I have not tried any other varieties from this region except for Malbec.

I wish I had taken notes or photos of the wines that I have drunk as I cannot recall the names of hardly any of them (if I saw the bottles/labels I could probably remember), but there is no doubt there are some very decent and high quality wines available. I find that they require a good decant/air time. Younger wines can be tannic and hard to approach. One we had last year was a 2008 Achaval Ferrer, Finca Mirador (Mendoza). It was stunning. We had a 2002 from a small producer that was extremely elegant and to die for (sorry no name of producer).

I’ve had a couple of decent wines from Concha Y Toro, but could not give the faintest idea of what wines or vintages.

In answering your question about wines about $20 rrp, at a recent tasting of Malbecs to benchmark some Australian styles / regions, we tried a few commercially available wines (not sure of exact pricing), the final listing in order of preference of the wines tasted were as follows:
Alamos (Argentina)
Catena (Argentina)
Pueblo (Argentina)
Zuccardi (Argentina)
Lunta (Argentina)
Macho Gaucho (Argentina)
Casillera del Diablo (Chile)
IQUE (Argentina)

My thoughts were that the Alamos and Catena were very good, the rest were of modest quality scoring about 15s or in some cases below. The Alamos I have had since and I really enjoy this. From memory is $30-$35 here in Oz.

Out of the interest, in this tasting 2 x Australian Wines that scored the highest were a McGuigan Wine and Bleasedale Wine.

My sister recently did a 3 day wine tour / visit through Mendoza. She loved the wines, the people and the region, whilst enjoying Malbec, she fell in love with Tannat. Every tasting was followed up or accompanied by large meat dishes. I am very envious. I’ll see if I can get the names of the wineries that they visited and post here at a later date. She brought a few Tannat examples back with her but have not had a chance to catch up with her to try them.

I spent a 10 months travelling around South America a few years ago and spent a good chunk of time in both Argentina and Chile. I was lucky to make an Argentinian friend in Mendoza that was also a sommelier who had plenty of suggestions of things to try. Surprising I found that despite Malbec being the most famous, the best wines always had a good portion of Cabernet and usually a few others in the blend too. Look for higher altitude vineyards from the Uco Valley, Tupangato, ect.

Unfortunately not a lot makes it over here and very rarely at a reasonable price. But the wineries I always lookout for are below.

Argentina
Bodega Caro
Atamisque
Bodega Bressia
Monteviejo
Carmelo Patti
Renacer
Mauricio Lorca

I'll have to get back to you on stuff from Chile. I remember Aboleda and Casillero del Diablo being good value, particularly in good vintages but that's all off the top of my head.

I own some Antiyal 2011 Carmenere from Chile, which was exhibited at the Return to Terroir tasting in Melbourne in 2015(so it is also certified Bio dynamic) and we purchased some as a result. I've also had some Perez Cruz Reserve Carmenere some years back that was decent.
When I was in Chile a decade ago I remember trying the Almaviva which was superb. It's a joint venture between Concha y Toro and Baron Philippe de Rothschild, and is Cabernet based. I haven't had the opportunity to try it since but it was certainly priced at a premium.
I also remember drinking Santa Rita Cabernet that was very good.
The Casillero del Diablo that a couple of people have mentioned, which is more at the cheap and cheerful end of the scale, is made by Concha y Toro

For Argentina, my most recent tasting of Malbecs, which was a couple of years ago left me fairly unexcited. I don't know if that was vintage related, or my tastes had changed or something else.
I had some Rutini malbec a few years ago that was enjoyable.
When in Argentina on the same holiday at decade ago, I remember drinking a fair amount of Luigi Bosca malbec. I also visited Lagarde and enjoyed their better wines. I revisited one of those at San Telmo restaurant in Melbourne a couple of years ago and it was as good as I remembered.
With the Tannat, I don't think it is a big thing around Mendoza - I think most of the Argentinian tannat comes from around Salta, further north. I believe that Uruguay is also producing well regarded Tannat.