Fun to write and even more fun to research: I have a new article on Slate about yerba mate and wine, Argentina's two signature beverages.

If ever you’re in Santiago, taking the wine tour at Cousiño-Macul is really something you should do. I did, and ended up buying a case, which I do not regret one whit. First, some basics. Though Chile has a burgeoning wine industry, finding out about wine tours is surprisingly challenging. There are some bus tours that I find quite expensive and therefore, did not do. Unlike California, you have to pay the winery for a tour and you need to schedule it beforehand. These things run about $10-$20 and will include a guide that walks you around a bit and usually tasting two wines (though, if you’re friendly and eager, they might open up other bottles just for fun!). Getting to Cousiño-Macul is super easy if you don’t have a car or a designated driver: take the subway to the Quilin station and then hail a cab (or walk for half an hour) to Avenida Quilin 7100, the winery.

Unlike many of the other large wineries founded in the 19th century, CM is still owned by the family that started it and not by a mass of anonymous shareholders (read: Concha y Toro, which we also visited and which was a smooth well-oiled machine producing dependable wines… a big superstore rather than craftsmanship. Meh.) This means the owners have a personal (not just financial) investment in the history of the winery. And it means you get to see a lot more of the actual process, a real education not in wine-tasting snobbery, but in the art of making it.



In this room, tons and tons of grapes are sorted and eventually moved into these steel vats before being transferred to French barrels for aging.

From the “Export Room,” the original 19th century machines used to transfer wine to bottles, cork them, and then the stencils with the names of the destinations. Apparently, it was exported for free to Alaska in exchange for barrels.




Cousiño-Macul “Gris” Cabernet Sauvignon 2008, Maipo Valley, Santiago de Chile: Martin, the guide and aspiring sommelier, presents “Gris”… This is not a rosé… it’s color is a bit more amber and the flavor less fruity. Passion fruit on the nose and always worth picking up. The story goes that, following the French tradition, each winery should have its own personal, distinctive wine that they do. This is CM’s.



During a particularly bad earthquake years ago, the barrels in this cellar were ruptured and it became a sea of wine, into which workers dived, drank, and, well became drunk. That harvest was lost (of course!) but you can still see the “water”-level on the walls.


Cousiño-Macul Antiguas Reservas Cabernet Sauvignon 2007, Maipo Valley, Santiago de Chile: The second wine we tasted was an excellent cabernet, strong, peppery, well-balanced and mature (even only after two years!). I bought plenty of this as well.


Oh, okay, a couple of photos from Concha y Toro (including the fabled “Casillero del Diablo”… which I personally believe is a marketing story made up for visitors).

Argentine winemaker Trivento hosted a five wine flight at MaQuiaVeLo, a wine bar in Asunción. The Mendoza wines ranged from bubbly to reds and all are definitely worth a try.

Wine 1: Trivento Brut Nature
McIntosh apples on the nose (i.e. the way it smelled). Taste of pear and mature apples, but not fruity. I like my sparkling wine rather dry and have in general been disappointed by what I've had that's made down here. I think the use of Pinot Noir in this (in addition to the Chardonnay that goes into sparkling wine) makes a pleasant difference. One of my two favorites from the night.

Wine 2: Trivento Tribu Chardonnay 2008
Fruit on the nose (lychee in syrup) and with breathing it opens up really nicely. The taste was lots of fruit and surprisingly minerally; it didn't linger long. Chardonnay isn't my favorite white wine grape, but I liked this.

Wine 3: Trivento Tribu Malbec 2008
Duck tallow on the nose (not a bad thing!) and something a bit smokey like molasses. The taste was not aggressive and a fine enough Malbec to be an acceptable enough wine to be an introduction to the grape. But it tasted young and unremarkable.

Wine 4: Trivento Reserve Malbec 2007
Peppery, acidy, spicy on the nose. A well-rounded, mature wine with a little bit of acid and wood-- a robust Malbec. This was my other favorite from the night.

Wine 5: Trivento Dulce Natural Malbec
This is a sweet red wine served cold. The nose was copper (blood! again, not a bad thing) and pomegranate. The taste? Pure pomegranate. People in the room compared it to sangría (fittingly, I suppose)-- I liked it and would definitely bring it to parties.


Incidentally, I liked that the two representatives from Trivento (who I got to chatting with after the tour and who welcome all to visit the vineyard in Mendoza) took their time walking the crowd of people through how to "taste" wine and how they insisted that the best wine is the one you want to return to. I have a strongly held aversion to the elite snobbery that too frequently goes along with drinking wine. This is the stuff peasants have been making in their farm houses for milennia--common and comfort food, not the exclusive scary thing it has become thanks to jargon--a sentiment my good friend Robin Goldstein (who is committed to demystifying and unmasking a lot of the, er, mystification that swirls around wine-drinking) has written about in his book, The Wine Trials.