The Wine Advocate 2015 – The results

The new Parker Points for Argentine Wines have been announced. Year after year the wine industry waits anxiously to see whether their wines have made the grade, as these precious points can leave a large footprint on the sales of Argentine wines.

For the second consecutive year Luis Gutierrez, taster for Wine Advocate for Argentina, visited our country. The tastings took place at different stages during the year and in total 1056 wines from different regions, altitudes and latitudes were presented.

Let’s have a look at the Parker 100 point rating system:

● 96-100 – Extraordinary
● 90-95 – Outstanding
● 85-89 – Very Good
● 80-84 – Barely above average
● 70-79 – Average
● 60-69 – Below average
● 50-59 – Unacceptable

If we analyse the correlation between points and price one can see that there is a positive relationship. So the lowest scores correspond to the wines with the lowest prices and the highest scores usually correspond to those with the highest price tags. If we look at the wines in excess of $100 we can see that they have 91 points or more. Now, the interesting thing is to see what is beyond the trend line, where $13 wines scored 91 points or $30 wines scored 93 or 94 points. Here we see that above all, price/quality excellence has been awarded.

Correlation between points & price

The wines presented reflect the great diversity of Argentina, reds, rosés and whites, still and sparkling, varietals or blends. As is shown in the following chart “Average Points (varietal, number of samples),” the majority of samples submitted focused on Malbec, with a total of 443. After Malbec, blends followed with 220, Cabernet Sauvignon with 103 and the other categories ranged between 13 and 50 samples.

The greatest variation in percentage was seen with Malbec followed by red Blends, both with an average of about 90 points. The average Pinot was around 90 points, while the average the Cabernet was close to 88.3 points. It was clear that the efforts made with Bonarda were not reflected in either the number of samples submitted or the scores obtained: 25 samples in over 1000, with an average of 87.75 points.

This reminds me of a comment that the previous Wine Advocate taster, Neal Martin, made when he said that we should concentrate on entry level Bonardas and leave the high-end wines to Malbecs and blends.

Average Points (varietal – number of samples)

If we look at the provinces, their participation and scores, we can see that the highest scores come from Salta and Rio Negro (many samples from the same high-end winery helped this trend). Mendoza with more than 82% of the samples nearly reached an average of 89.57 points. Buenos Aires, still a new area with only 5 samples did not exceed 87 points and San Juan with almost 20% of the country´s output were able to present 17 wines.

Average points (Province – number of samples)

Only 3% of the wines obtained less than 84 points and the same percentage scored 95 or more points. The vast majority were concentrated in approximately 46% of wines between 90-94 and 48% between 85-89 points.

Distribution by score

The same relationship is found when exclusively analysing red wines. A radical change in white wines where almost 40% received 90 points or more, 55% got 85-89 points and 6% for wines less than 84 points, doubling the national average.

Distribution by range of points

When considering the three provinces with the highest number of samples, it is clear that Mendoza respects the same relation to the country, while Salta received more points between 90-94 and Rio Negro stood out with wines over 95 points.

	Mendoza	Salta	Río Negro
81-84	2,52%	0,00%	2,63%
85-89	46,85%	38,10%	44,74%
90-94	46,74%	59,52%	44,74%
95-98	3,32%	1,19%	7,89%

TOP 15 RED WINES

Year	Wine Name	Province	Varietal	Rating
2011	Bodega Aleanna Gran Enemigo Gualtallary Single Vineyard	MZ	Malbec	98
2011	Bodegas Catena Zapata Malbec Catena Zapata Adrianna Vineyard	MZ	Malbec	98
2013	Achaval Ferrer Malbec Finca Altamira	MZ	Malbec	97
2013	Familia Zuccardi Finca Piedra Infinita	MZ	Malbec	97
2013	Bodega Noemia de Patagonia Noemia	RN	Malbec	97
2013	Per Se La Craie	MZ	Malbec	97
2013	Achaval Ferrer Malbec Finca Mirador	MZ	Malbec	96
2013	Bodega Los Valientes Chachingo Legend	MZ	Blend T	96
2013	Chacra Treinta y Dos	RN	Pinot Noir	96
2012	Bodega Colome Altura Maxima Malbec	Salta	Malbec	96
2013	Familia Zuccardi Finca Canal Uco	MZ	Malbec	96
2013	Per Se Jubileus	MZ	Malbec	96
2013	Vivo o Muerto La Verdad Gualtallary	MZ	Malbec	96
2013	Achaval Ferrer Malbec Finca Bella Vista	MZ	Malbec	95
2011	Bodega Aleanna El Gran Enemigo	MZ	Blend T	95

RANKING OF RED WINES WITH THE BEST PRICE/QUALITY RATIO *

Year	Wine Name	Province	Varietal	Rating
2013	Alamos Alamos Malbec	MZ	Malbec	90
2013	Tilia Cabernet Sauvignon	MZ	Cabernet Sauvignon	90
2014	Tilia Malbec	MZ	Malbec	90
2013	Tilia Malbec	MZ	Malbec	90
2014	Vista del Sur Winery High Note Red Blend	MZ	Blend T	90
2014	Susana Balbo Crios Red Blend	MZ	Blend T	90
2014	Zorzal Wines Terroir Unico Malbec	MZ	Malbec	90
2014	Zorzal Wines Terroir Unico Pinot Noir	MZ	Pinot Noir	90
2014	Gen del Alma JI JI JI	MZ	Blend T	91

* Points obtained per dollar invested

TOP 10 WHITE WINES

Year	Wine Name	Province	Varietal	Rating
2011	Bodegas Catena Zapata White Bones Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	97
2011	Bodegas Catena Zapata White Stones Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	96
2012	Bodegas Catena Zapata White Bones Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	95
2012	Bodegas Catena Zapata White Stones Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	94
2009	Passionate Wines @micheliniwine Blanco Gualtallary	MZ	Sauvignon Blanc	93
2013	Bodega Aleanna El Enemigo Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	93
2015	Gen del Alma JI JI JI Chenin Blanc	MZ	Chenin Blanc	93
2014	La Giostra del Vino Saltimbanco Sauvignon Blanc	MZ	Sauvignon Blanc	93
2014	Luca G Lot Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	93

RANKING OF WHITE WINES WITH THE BEST PRICE/QUALITY RATIO*

Year	Wine Name	Province	Varietal	Rating
2015	Gen del Alma JI JI JI Chenin Blanc	MZ	Chenin Blanc	93
2014	Finca Las Nubes Torrontés	Salta	Torrontés	91
2013	Alamos Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	90
2012	Alamos Torrontés	MZ	Torrontés	90
2014	Bodega Colome Torrontés	Salta	Torrontés	90
2013	Familia Zuccardi Torrontés Serie A	MZ	Torrontés	90
2014	La Giostra del Vino Bacan Blanco Clásico	MZ	Blend B	90
2014	Manos Negras Atrevida Chardonnay	MZ	Chardonnay	90
2014	Susana Balbo Crios Torrontés	MZ	Torrontés	90
2015	Zorzal Wines Terroir Unico Sauvignon Blanc	MZ	Sauvignon Blanc	90

* Points obtained per dollar invested

Conclusions

After studying the increase in the number of samples tasted and the scores obtained, one can have a greater understanding of the country´s wines from the point of view of Luis Gutierrez.

A large number of samples from a handful of wineries were displayed; 40% of the samples were submitted by 30 wineries (15% of the 199 wineries that were present).

There is no relationship between the amount of wine produced and the number of samples from each region (e.g Salta has 1% of the total surface area cultivated and represented 8% of samples tasted)

Some new old players appeared; winemakers or agronomists with long, successful careers came with their own wine labels and obtained high scores and were in no way considered beginners as they based the success of their new projects on the brands created around their names.

The increase in wines tasted is 20% more than the previous year when they achieved 50% of wines with 90 points or more (a quantum leap compared with 34% in April 2014) and 15% at 89 points. Finally, it is worth mentioning that this year two labels achieved 98 points surpassing the 97 points scored last year. Each point above the maximum and each point above the national average helps to push the Argentine wine industry forward.

By María Laura Ortiz Sommelier AAS
International Diploma A.S.I Certified Sommelier CMS
Note: This report is based entirely on information obtained in the report published by Wine Advocate and it does not reflect a personal view of the current industry or the style of the wines presented.

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