Argentina's small Altamira region should be on more radars! Here at the base of the Andes mountains, the dramatic climate of intensely dry, sunny days and rapidly cooling nights leads to wines of sturdy concentration and enticing complexity, delivered with welcome elements of aromatic and textural finesse. We particularly love TintoNegro's "Finca La Escuela" Malbec from Tinto Negro because it's an especially expressive and highly drinkable Altamira at a great price!
The 2019 La Escuela Malbec comes from a vineyard whose soils are a patchwork of ancient Tunuyán River deposits of silt, sand, gravel, and stones, each contributing to the complexity of the final wine. Its ripe, mouth-filling flavors are given life by a juicy inner brightness and framed by a "crushed stone" texture of tannins; the fruit's powerful breadth feels tapered at the edges, never weighing down the palate. The soft, generous fruit - imbued with floral, herbal, and subtle toasty spice accents - gives way to a lightly savory finish.
While nature does a lot of the work, it takes top-class management in the vineyard and cellar to make a harmoniously balanced wine like this. There are around ten different harvests over 3 weeks for the various plots that make up this wine! Fermentation is kept cool, and extraction from the skins is gentle, bringing out the best of what's built into those grapes. Tinto Negro began as an independent project by Alejandro Sejanovich (Tim Atkin's 2021 Winemaker of the Year) and Jeff Mausbach, who were coworkers at the famous Catena Zapata winery. They were later joined by Mendoza native, Jorge Crotta.
VINOUS MEDIA 95 POINTS - "The 2019 Malbec Tintonegro Finca La Escuela is a single vineyard that comes from Paraje Altamira, Uco Valley. It was cold fermented in small batches before aging for 12 months in French barrels, 15% of them new. Purplish red in the glass. The nose delivers fresh plum, thyme, violets and a general fruitiness featuring cherry and quince. The broad palate flows juicily, stretching out the flavors. This nuanced, complex wine is very much a sum of the different parts of the vineyard it came from; its qualities enhanced by the cool year." - Joaquin Hidalgo, Vinous
The 2019 La Escuela Malbec comes from a vineyard whose soils are a patchwork of ancient Tunuyán River deposits of silt, sand, gravel, and stones, each contributing to the complexity of the final wine. Its ripe, mouth-filling flavors are given life by a juicy inner brightness and framed by a "crushed stone" texture of tannins; the fruit's powerful breadth feels tapered at the edges, never weighing down the palate. The soft, generous fruit - imbued with floral, herbal, and subtle toasty spice accents - gives way to a lightly savory finish.
While nature does a lot of the work, it takes top-class management in the vineyard and cellar to make a harmoniously balanced wine like this. There are around ten different harvests over 3 weeks for the various plots that make up this wine! Fermentation is kept cool, and extraction from the skins is gentle, bringing out the best of what's built into those grapes. Tinto Negro began as an independent project by Alejandro Sejanovich (Tim Atkin's 2021 Winemaker of the Year) and Jeff Mausbach, who were coworkers at the famous Catena Zapata winery. They were later joined by Mendoza native, Jorge Crotta.
VINOUS MEDIA 95 POINTS - "The 2019 Malbec Tintonegro Finca La Escuela is a single vineyard that comes from Paraje Altamira, Uco Valley. It was cold fermented in small batches before aging for 12 months in French barrels, 15% of them new. Purplish red in the glass. The nose delivers fresh plum, thyme, violets and a general fruitiness featuring cherry and quince. The broad palate flows juicily, stretching out the flavors. This nuanced, complex wine is very much a sum of the different parts of the vineyard it came from; its qualities enhanced by the cool year." - Joaquin Hidalgo, Vinous
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