Malbec Argentino

Malbec Argentino is a single-variety Malbec from Bodega Catena Zapata in Mendoza, Argentina, blending fruit from two of the family's historic vineyards. The larger share comes from Nicasia, in the Altamira district of the Uco Valley, at about 1,095 metres, where very shallow loamy topsoil sits over surface gravel and a stony dry riverbed subsoil that drains freely.

The remainder, around a fifth of the wine, comes from the Angelica vineyard at roughly 920 metres in the Lunlunta district of Maipu, planted between 1922 and 1924 on light gravel, loam and clay beside a dry river bed. The two sites are linked by plant material

rather than geography: Nicasia was planted in 1996 with the hundred-year-old massale selection of ungrafted Malbec taken from Angelica, so the wine draws on one vine population grown in two climates.

Both vineyards are ungrafted, a practice that has largely disappeared outside Argentina. Angelica sits in a slightly warmer site, and the cooler Nicasia contributes natural acidity and cool-climate texture. Winemaking begins with an extensive cold maceration of two to ten days below 10 degrees Celsius, using 10 to 30% whole cluster, to draw out aromatics.

Fermentation runs roughly 17 to 28 days, with total maceration of about 25 to 38 days, and the wine is then raised 15 to 18 months in French oak barrels of first, second and third use.