AGUARIBAY | Malbec | 2014
malbec
WineStatistics will be evaluating wines in no particular order on no particular schedule. Just stay tuned and you will never miss one. If the wine is tasted more than once, the rating table will be updated so as to reflect all the new impressions and observations. The logic is simple – the more we taste, the more we learn.
Tonight we are going to review a wine which stands tall amongst its peers – Aguaribay Malbec 2014 from La Compagnie Vinicole Baron Edmond de Rothschild. The Rothschild family is one of the most famous wine-making families in the world of wine, as it is the same family that owns the world famous Château Lafite, Château des Laurets and Château Clarke to name just a few. This wine is an expression of terroir from the Vista Flores appellation in the famous Mendoza region of Argentina. Known for its plump, dark fruit flavors and smoky finish, malbec grapes seem to have found their ideal location on these plots of rocks, granite pebbles and alluvial gravels perched at 1,100 metres above sea level.
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Take a look at the tasting notes bellow and our detailed assessment of the wine:
Visual
Deep garnet color with nuanced indigo-purple shades towards the rim.
Olfactory
The nose is strong, filled mostly with blue and black fruit: blueberry, blackberry, blue plum, black currant, rose hips, black cherry, overripe sour cherry, black mulberry and some nuanced hints of figs. An instant later comes secondary and tertiary notes of roasted oakwood, nutmeg, cloves, leather, red pepper and some subtle hints of tobacco.
Gustatory
The wine is dry, with high alcohol level, high acidity and ripe tannin. It feels bold, muscular and velvety, with a nuanced new-world profile. This is a well structured, expressive and complex wine, with a good overall balance between barrique and fruit.
Aftertaste
The wine has a long finish and a velvety, maybe just a a bit sharp aftertaste.
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This is definitely a great Wine of Argentina and the overall rating says the same, with 91.4 points scored it is right there, among the best wines we’ve tasted so far. Please click on the chart icon on the left in order to get to the wine rating page, where you can find all the wines we’ve tasted to date.
Conclusion: this is a wine in its peak form, definitely ready to drink now, but also worth some more bottle ageing (for 2 to 3 years). It is a blueprint of a classic Mendoza Malbec wine – fruity, complex and well structured. Argentina’s main advantage is the altitude, as more and more growers are moving closer to the mountains. On these high altitudes the nights are cooler, which is an advantage because usually the grapes reach full maturity only at high sugar levels, thus making it possible to harvest grapes before sugar content is overwhelming. We would recommend to pair this wine with grilled steak or sauce based meat dishes, like for example beef goulash, as the acidity and the tannin in the wine will cut well through the rustic and meaty notes in the dish.
WineStatistics tasting results:
AGUARIBAY
Malbec | 2014
grape: | malbec |
overall rating: | 91.4 |
conclusion: great | a must try
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(c) The WineStatistics ratings are based solely on our own knowledge of the world of wine and on our personal wine tastes, which may, or may not, differ from yours – the reader. There are no absolutes of right and wrong in wine appreciation.
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