TN MalbecMania, + Bdx, Loire, and Rosato

Dale (and others): have you had any Argentinian Malbecs that have really impressed you? I've had a few that were marginally interesting, but nothing that would motivate me to make a special search of the market. Just wondering if I'm missing something here

p.s. It's not that I dislike the grape: I've had a few Cahors that I've really liked.

Mark Lipton

My little local tasting group was having trouble finding dates for September/October, between Jewish holidays and members having extended business trips to Australia and France. Then Thursday someone said "how about tomorrow", and by miracle we realized 5 of the 6 of us were free. Alex said he would host, and suggested Argentine Malbec. I didn't have any in cellar (though I wish I had some Acheval Ferrer), so was happy when Fred suggested broadening it to Malbec from anywhere.

2005 Catena Malbec Similar, a tad less weighty and less oaky. Still fruit forward, but a little less exuberant and more balanced. B Turns out that one of the blind bottles was another bottle of this, and most of us thought it very similar to the first two. Surprise.

Dale, Same here. We opened a bottle of this last week and were a bit disappointed. It was much 'thinner' than the 2004 we enjoyed last year.

Jon

Navarro Correas makes a decent one for easy consumption but overall I haven't been particularly impressed with any of them. France does a much better job with Malbec but the cost is much more.

I've had some experience with Norton here in China, actually. They have an absolutely revolting Merlot and also a "lowest rung" Malbec under the monkier "barrel select" that is really boozy in character with a shallow finish. I've seen some bottles of the Malbec Reserve floating around here as well but the price is excessive. It's like

30USD for one bottle...seem to remember seeing it around 10-15 on some vendor sites. I'm worried about dropping the cash for it because most of the wines I've had come from ASC wines; a big importer around China. Their wines tend to be cooked and subject to the elements...

I really want to give it a try, but I'm going to have to save my allowance for a month. heh

I THINK this wine is also available around here. I drank it at some "big wig" tasting put on by a fancy hotel. Funny to watch folks get drunk at a wine tasting...the whole spitting thing...only done by me and one of my friends.

I found this wine to be rather flat and without much character.

Very much enjoyed Finca Flichman Malbec - Lots of berries (predominantly Blackberry IIRC) and chocolate. ~$15 CDN (also IIRC)

I looked at winesearcher. Varies according to vintage,but looks like the Achaval Ferrer single vineyards (all good, preferred Mirador by a hair over Bella Vista and Altamir) start around $75. I liked a lot, but lots of other stuff I like at that price!

Yeah, it's hard to be very exploratory at that price point. After all, that's 5 Brun VVs ;-)

Mark Lipton