Argentina, good wine is drunk in Mendoza

What links Italy to Argentina? Lots of things, despite the distance. Italian immigration was massive, and many of the most illustrious Argentines are of Italic origin: for example, Pope Bergoglio, whose ancestors came from Piedmont, and Lionel Messi, with ancestry even in Recanati, like Leopardi. Maradona was not of Italian origin, but he became an honorary Neapolitan. We have two slightly different conceptions of football, they consider us too suited to defense, but at the moment we have in common that we have just won their respective continental championships for nations, Italy in Europe and Argentina in South America.

Only wine lovers will think of another, important similarity between the two countries: the passion for wine, precisely, as a factor of economic production, of identity of the territory, of tourism and (why not?) Of culture, too. if referring to culture when it comes to wine has become a bit cloying habit.

Among the childhood memories may have remained that of the airplane Pedro, who in a famous Walt Disney cartoon flew a package of letters between Santiago de Chile and Mendoza in Argentina, perilously climbing Aconcagua, that is the highest peak. high in the Andes. Mendoza, the real one, is a city with a view of Aconcagua but located on the first slopes of the mountains, at seven or eight hundred meters above sea level; the surroundings, looking at the horizon, do not seem fertile, and indeed appear largely barren, yet in this area, in past generations, some French (and also Spanish, and a little Italian) winemakers have selected the right land to plant vineyards and obtain the best Argentine wine, so good that it is appreciated all over the world, including Italy. The vines that have taken root here are in particular the French Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay, in addition to the Spanish Tempranillo.

In time of Covid, a wine trip to Argentina is not at the top of the agenda of international travelers, but years ago we tasted it, and sooner or later the skies will have to reopen (really reopen, we mean) to intercontinental flights. The vineyards and cellars of mendoza welcomed visitors, maybe now will not be the time, but the post-pandemic dawn may not be far away, and then you can start doing some projects with a not very long deadline.

Let’s get into the topic. Here the word agritourism seems to be unknown, but agritourism centers do exist, and one of the best is the Finca Adalgisa in Luján de Cuyo. Basically it is a mini-hotel (about ten rooms) in an old renovated farm, with an adjoining two-hectare vineyard that produces wine for the consumption of guests only. There is a restaurant, but if you spend the night at Finca Adalgisa you can also do without a real dinner and eat the rich platter of cold cuts, cheeses and vegetables that is offered together with the wine; the wine is a Malbec, of French origin, although the owners and managers are of Italian origin. There are bicycles available to discover the surroundings, and upon returning you can cool off in the pool. When we were there, the function of scarecrow on the vineyard was carried out by two hawks, friendly and curious towards human beings; we imagine that now they are still there, they or their descendants.

It responds to a completely different conception of the O’Fournier wine estate and winery in Valle de Uco, one of the main producers of Tempranillo with 600,000 bottles a year. The area is huge and the buildings of design; in the tasting rooms and in the aging rooms you can feel the hand of the architects. But this does not spoil the atmosphere: even in Italy many wineries now look like this.

The same can be said of the Salentein estate (which means “Salento”), also in Valle de Uco, which pushes the combination of tradition and contemporary design even further, with results that we believe are inferior, except in a spectacular circular underground room. with columns and five thousand barrels: a cellar with a suggestive glance. Salentein produces Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and White Sauvignon and does so in various estates, including that of Casa Grande, a historic building now in ruins where the Jesuits (the same order as Pope Bergoglio) began to cultivate the vine long ago.

Since everyone around here wants to have their say, let’s put the Swiss and here is the Entre Cielos estate at Luján de Cuyo, owned by a Swiss group that also has activities in Italy and Greece. This estate in the middle of the vineyards offers a luxury hotel with 16 rooms and a spa, all in a strong combination of tradition and modernity, given that some structures are elevated and seem to fly over the vineyards like spaceships. In the spa you can also bathe in wine, made from Malbec vines.

We could mention many other wineries, but our aim was just to taste a few sips. If you do not want to stay overnight in the vineyard, in Mendoza there are agencies that offer an organized tour during the day. We close by recalling again the relationship between Argentina and Italy. A proverb says that “Argentines are Italians who speak Spanish and pretend to be English”. The reference to the British must be explained: it refers to the presence of a local British community, small but very influential on a social and cultural level. Instead, the reference to Italians is obvious, and is confirmed every time you hear the accent of these parts, which of all the Hispanic languages, from Spain to Latin America to the Philippines, offers the closest to Italian sounds. Some say that if the millions of Italian immigrants had arrived here all speaking Italian, instead of splitting into their dialects (they were Piedmontese, Calabrian, Venetian, Sicilian etc., instead of Italians) now in Argentina Italian would be the official language. However, the wine lived up to our expectations.