The Malbec Experience

Well we finished off the Routas Infernet from yesterday and boy did it open up after 24 hours. Just goes to show that I should have decanted the wine and given it time to "breathe" (sounds wierd, huh? - decant a $12 wine! just goes to show, don't judge a wine by its price) before guzzling it down. Wines of a medium age can sometimes "close down" and their true colours only show after they mature; decanting a wine and leaving it for a while may mimic this maturation (by exposure to air - mostly the oxygen in the air - which will then change the chemical nature of the wine via oxidation).
Enough mumbo jumbo, lets taste!!
Well the girlfriend won 1st prize in a photography competition today so she wants to have a bottle of wine to celebrate. So I pull out the top bottle and it turns out to be an Argentine malbec, Finca Flinchman Reserva, 2004. Argentina is one of the biggest wine producers in the world and they are arriving in north america in greater numbers. Malbec is their signature grape. This one has a medium dark stained cork, a smoked meat nose and is pretty black in the glass (Malbec is the the grape of Cahors in France, known for it's black wines; in "weak" years, in the past, some Bordeaux winemakers would sneak some Cahors into their barrels to "strengthen" their wines). On the palate it is medium full bodied and delicious. Soft smooth tannins leave a nice finish.
The rating: GOOD.
Value for the money: I think it was in the $10-15 range - buy a case at this price!

Cheers! By the way, here is the winning photo: