Paris, France
I don’t remember the first malbec I tasted. But I do remember the first one I couldn’t afford.
It was at Don Julio, back when it was still a neighborhood joint, before the Michelin star, before the global fame. The place felt lived-in, the kind of spot where you could walk in without a reservation and leave smelling like firewood and fat. Even then, Pablo, the owner, had a cellar that was borderline legendary.
I was a broke student. My friend Frank T. invited me to dinner and ordered a bottle so far out of my budget it might as well have been from another planet. I can still see the label, the waiter’s glance, the feeling of drinking something I had no business touching. And I carry a piece of advice from that night—unrelated to wine—that still echoes today.
These days, I’m lucky enough to cellar a few malbecs of my own. That label—not the same vintage, but close enough—sits in my collection. Some of those bottles probably belong to nights just like that one.
Malbec, like so many good things in Argentina, started somewhere else. France, to be exact. Cahors. Back then, it was a bit player, called Cot. Tough-skinned, rustic, usually blended into something else.
But Argentina has a way of taking foreign things and making them better. Football. Polo. Psychoanalysis. Even pizza. We don’t just import—we adapt, we absorb, we own. With malbec, we did it again.
In Mendoza, the grape found its home. It drank in the altitude, the sun, the quiet of the Andes. It became expressive, generous, unafraid. But in Salta? It didn’t just adapt—it transformed. Darker. Spicier. More intense. Something no one else had seen. That’s why so many of the wines we share come from there. Not because it’s easy, but because it’s irreplaceable.
Early on, Argentinians brought in the big names—winemakers from Bordeaux, Napa, Burgundy. Their hands helped. Their reputations helped more. But the real shift came later, when the young winemakers, the ones watching and learning, started stealing tricks and rewriting the rules.
They didn’t just mimic. They made malbec their own, bringing in their own style, their own signature. And more than style, they brought consistency. Not a fluke vintage or a marketing stunt, but solid, soulful wines, year after year.
Fifteen years ago, someone gave malbec a birthday: April 17th. Why? Because it had already become a fixture on every Argentine table—the guest who always shows up, always brings something good, always gets invited back. And now, fifteen years later, feliz quinceañera, malbec.
You’ve earned the crown. And the dancing shoes.
If wine had a spirit animal, malbec’s would be a gaucho with a knife in hand, standing by the fire in a leather apron, humming a folk song. Proud, a little rough around the edges, but generous to the bone.
I’ve been lucky. Those unaffordable dinners? I get to pay them forward now. Every so often, I’ll pull out a bottle that makes someone pause and think, “This is too good for me.” Nonsense. Malbec, like life’s best pleasures, isn’t meant to be exclusive. It’s for sharing—over fire, with steak, among friends.
Because this isn’t just wine. It’s how we remember where we’ve been. And why we keep coming back.
Talk soon,
Diego
