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The diverse and widespread wine scene of South America has never been more exciting. Its winemakers are fearlessly taking new directions while revaluing the strengths of the past. New wine regions are being pioneered at a swift pace in once-unimaginable places, while old vines in neglected regions are finally getting some of the attention they deserve. Amanda Barnes reports.

Once considered a continent of mainly meaty reds, South America can no longer be painted with such a broad brush, as sparkling, white, pink, and orange wines are also coming to the fore. Here are some of the winemakers, at wineries both large and small, who are leading us into the future of South American wine.

That Uruguay became famous for its brooding, dark black Tannat wines is perhaps surprising. With an Atlantic coastal climate and endless, golden sandy beaches, you would have thought that Uruguay was bound to be white wine territory.

In a country where cows outnumber people three to one, and beef is a staple at almost every meal, it was perhaps a cultural steering that led wineries to make Tannat their champion variety. It certainly pairs well with the local asado (barbecue), and the thick skins have proved an asset in the country’s often rainy climate. Tannat’s naturally stable nature, with high acid and feisty tannins, probably also helped it become the most desirable variety on which to lean.

Read the full article in Decanter, September 2022

In recent years, the Champenois have spread wings around the world – from Napa, California to Ningxia, China. But the first major investment of a Champagne house abroad was in Argentina. Moët & Chandon’s first outpost beyond France was Chandon Argentina in Mendoza, in the late 1950s.

It was a bold statement. But one that paid off. Chandon, although now joined by subsidiaries in Brazil, California, Australia, China and India, remains the most profitable and largest of LVMH’s sparkling wine houses outside Champagne. Not only did Argentina prove to be great for producing sparkling wine, but for drinking it, too.

Read the full article in Decanter, September 2022

I’m giving scores of above 90 like I’ve never given before!’ exclaimed fellow panel taster Dirceu Vianna Junior MW, as we were getting to the end of a long, but delicious day of tasting. ‘I have been involved with Decanter for more than 10 years and I cannot remember such a success rate.’

Vianna was not alone in his enthusiasm. Together we tasted 75 wines, and 72% of those wines scored 90 points or above. At Decanter, that means it is a wine that has complexity and precision – a benchmark wine. Anything that touches, or even nearly touches, Gold at 95pts is not only exemplary but thrilling. And we tasted some thrilling wines.

Read the full article in Decanter, September 2022

This is how we always used to make wines in Argentina… Torrontés was an orange wine before it was a white wine,” explains Matías Michelini as he plunges his bare hands and tattooed forearms into a bin filled with Torrontés grapes. Foam appears around the grape skins while a posse of family members (Matías is one of four brothers, each of whom have four children) and friends mill around him. Wicker baskets filled with recently picked grapes are animatedly being poured into large vats as the teenagers foot stomp them to the sound of bachata music.

“These are family wines and handmade wines—it’s nothing new really,” says Michelini. It might be nothing new, but there’s undoubtedly a new movement underfoot in South America as winemakers bring old winemaking techniques and grape varieties back to the fore. And with them, they are bringing a wave of vibrant and juicy wines.

Read the full article in Wine Enthusiast, May 2022

As the terroir focus in South American wine continues to sharpen, the spotlight is increasingly being cast on the vineyard, says Amanda Barnes, with certain sites not only becoming known for their distinctive wines but also accruing cult status for themselves.

Until the 1990s, when it came to the wines of South America, brands and winery owners ruled the roost. Then, an era of flying winemakers in Argentina and Chile made the consultant winemaker the sales teams’ marketing pin-up, soon to be overshadowed by the local star winemakers. In recent years, however, the most exciting advances have been through the turbocharged quest to best represent ‘the place’ in the glass – whether that place is a subregion, appellation, single vineyard or even a single block. And as winemakers push beyond the traditional wine regions on the balmy valley floors, single-vineyard wines are becoming thrillingly diverse – from the wind-battered depths of Patagonia, to the lofty heights of the Andes Mountains or the edge of the bracing Pacific Ocean.

Here are eight of the most remarkable examples, all made from relatively new vines and subregions that are leading the pack in South America for unique, terroir-driven wines.

Read the full article in Club Oenologique, November 2021

There is an abundance of well-known South American wines that are capable of long ageing.

These include icons such as Almaviva and Nicolás Catena. However, I want to shine a light on some less well-known bottles I’ve found that you may not have heard of, but are certainly wines for the long haul that can still evolve beautifully over time.

I like to call it relic hunting.

Read the full article in Decanter, August 2022

Brought up in a Catholic family in Santiago, Marcelo Retamal knew he wanted to travel from a young age. He’d watched from the sidelines as his uncle, a renowned scientist, travelled worldwide and regaled him with inspiring tales from afar.

His own first taste of travel came in 1992 when the concert of his favourite band, Iron Maiden, was unceremoniously cancelled in Chile. ‘The church and state banned them from entering Chile for their demonic appearance… It was nonsense,” remembers Reta, as he’s known by friends. ‘So my parents got me a bus ticket to see them in Argentina. It was one of the best concerts in my life!’

Read the full article in Decanter, May 2022

One vine of Château Cheval Blanc’s vineyard carries just five or six clusters of grapes. That barely makes one bottle of wine, and – in the case of this esteemed Right Bank estate – about £500 worth of wine, depending on the vintage.

You could say these vines are almost worth their weight in gold… So why then has Cheval Blanc uprooted over 3,000 vines in order to plant humble fruit trees in the vineyard instead?

This tree planting is part of Cheval Blanc’s rather radical agroecology plan, which has been evolving since 2009 in a bid to mitigate the impact of climate change on the estate’s wines.

Read the full article in Decanter, April 2022

Tannat is undeniably the champion of Uruguay. Its hardy character and unbreakable personality performs well vintage after vintage and, as a result, Tannat is Uruguay’s most planted variety – accounting for more than one in four vines. But Tannat is not the only card up this small nation’s sleeve. Uruguay is actually home to a host of different varieties, spanning the vinous alphabet from Arneis to Zinfandel. And the huge range of wines to be found in Uruguay are all part of its heritage, while also being key to its innovative present and future.

Vines came to Uruguay, like the rest of the New World, in the hands of European immigrants, with the greatest influx occurring from the 1850s onwards. ‘We are all children of immigrants – from Italy, Spain and France, and each of them brought over vines on the boat,’ explains fifth- generation vigneron Gabriel Pisano, who makes Sangiovese at Viña Progreso as an ode to his Italian forefathers. ‘We also never had any regulations controlling what you plant.’

Read the full article in Decanter, September 2021