For the last three weeks in Mendoza, I’ve only been drinking one variety. It’s abounding with rich, dark fruit, grows particularly well here and is on the lips of most winemakers. Can you guess what it is yet? No, it’s not Malbec. It is the new dark horse of the eighth wine capital… a sort of Batman wine lurking in the shadows of Malbec, but gradually taking front stage as Gotham – ahem – Mendoza city wakes up to its power. The new, handsome superhero of Mendoza’s wine scene is Cabernet Franc.
Normally tucked away in blends, Cabernet Franc has been the Mendocinean winemaker’s secret weapon for the last decade or so. Enhancing Malbec with a fresh herbaceous aroma, floral elegance and a distinctive spice, Cabernet Franc has become the clandestine amigo of premium Malbec in Mendoza. As you winery hop in Lujan and the Uco Valley in particular, once you get to the top Malbecs* or blends you’ll often find the winemaker’s eyes brighten as he delivers a barrel sample with a little wink confessing ‘we’ve added just a bit of Cabernet Franc’. As a blending partner it can deepen and complexify the expression without masking its Malbec qualities. Cabernet Franc is an international comrade for red blends, but now its time has arrived to shine as the leading man.
Just a decade ago there was only one single variety Cabernet Franc made in all of Argentina, and it was like gold dust to get your hands on. These last couple of years however, have seen a real surge in single variety Cabernet Francs. Nowadays, in top restaurants and wine bars around Mendoza (and increasingly Buenos Aires) you’ll find upwards of 15 Cab Francs competing on the wine list and providing an extraordinary food partner. Production of single variety Cabernet Franc has tripled from 1.2m litres in 2006 to 3.4m litres in 2012. That is quite a jump from one lonely Cabernet Franc in 2001.
The 250% increase in plantings over the last 10 years (and 750% increase since 1990) suggests a boom, so is Cabernet Franc the next Malbec?
In short, the answer is No.
Although plantings have blossomed and word is out, 700 hectares of a variety in Argentina is a pocketful of small change (compared to 70,000 of Malbec). But more to the point, it is not Malbec. There will never be another Malbec because the Malbec boom came when land was cheap in Argentina, the Malbec was good (and cheap), Argentina was relatively undiscovered, and no-one else was producing a Malbec quite like it. Cabernet Franc on the other hand is booming in a period when the price of land in Mendoza increases by around 25% annually (you can even pick up a vineyard in Bordeaux for cheaper), good Cabernet Franc is not cheap to produce, and there are plenty of other Cabernet Francs in the metaphorical wine sea with major productions in France, USA, Italy and Canada to mention a few. Nonetheless, after the wake of Malbec, the world is now looking out for new Argentine wines and there is something undeniably special about Cabernet Franc from Mendoza…
If you’ve ever visited Mendoza, you’ll feel like you’ve walked into wine paradise – the sun dances across the sky every day, the air is pure and fresh, the nights are cool and the plants must be singing at the stunning Andes mountain views. It is the sort of place that vines from around the world would dream of moving to in their retirement. Even tough Tannat softens up here to become a plump and generous variety. So Cabernet Franc – with its equal berry load, tendency to share water kindly around the plant, early ripening, and often-impeccable behaviour – thrives here. Hardy Cabernet Franc is considered an ‘insurance’ variety in other parts of the world, but Mendoza’s climate doesn’t need ‘insurance’ varieties. And it is actually the Cabernet Franc that is made to suffer on poorer soils at higher altitude with more extreme day and night temperatures, that is reaping the rich and concentrated Cabernet Franc with great character and freshness that is driving Mendoza loco. “Cabernet Franc, when managed correctly on certain soils, has lots of personality and is very different to any other variety,” says Manuel Gonzalez, winemaker for Andeluna and previously Pulenta Estate (both renowned for the variety). “The future of Cabernet Franc in Argentina is great in terms of these high quality wines that we can reach.”
Cabernet Franc here is so good in fact that this year has seen a single variety Cabernet Franc top the Parker point charts. Bodega Aleanna’s Gran Enemigo Gualtallary Cabernet Franc was the highest scoring Argentine wine this year with an impressive 97 points in Wine Advocate. That is big news in Malbec country.