Wine Tour at Bodega Familia Zuccardi– Exploring Wine in Mendoza

The moment we’ve all been waiting for! It’s in the title! Let’s Explore (Mountains and) Wine! Thank you, Zuccardi Family, for a beautiful day filled with wonderful wine.

The Bodega Familia Zuccardi, on the outskirts of Mendoza in Maipú with the beautiful Andes mountains as a backdrop, is a family owned bodega that was opened in 1963. The still young bodega now has quite a renowned claim in the wine world. They export 50% of their wines to the US, so go look for it. It’s delicious. The Bodega Zuccardi Familia has three different wineries: Zuccardi, Santa Julia, and Malamado. The difference is the price range that they cater to and the quality of the wine.

Entrance to the Bodega Familia Zuccardi, in Maipú.

Map of the wine regions of Argentina.

Poster for the 10th annual wine tasting.

Mendoza is known for their Malbecs, because these grapes thrive on the dry climate in this arid region. Pinot Noir, on the other hand, is best grown in the Patagonian region of Argentina, and Chile is known for its Carmenere. I learned a lot on the tour. Anyway, Malbec wines originated and became famous in France, but in the recent past Argentina has become the biggest grower of Malbec grapes, competing mainly with California.

Huge vats of almost wine.

Pummeled grapes, ready to become wine.

Barrels of wine, ready to be bottled.

Wooden barrels, to flavor the wine.

Barrels of wine aging in a humid room to keep the wood from drying out.

We taste tested two kinds of wine, and I felt incredibly fancy. We did the sniffing and the swirling and the aerating in the mouth thing that was actually kind of difficult. I almost spit my wine out, definitely looked like a real adult. One of the wines was a traditional Malbec, “Zuccardi Q”. It was full-bodied and fruity, with just a hint of woodiness. I don’t know what any of that actually means, but it tasted really good. It would pair well with meat dishes. Or most food. Actually, I think it goes well with all food. I still know very little about wine. The other wine we tasted was a vino blanco licoroso, which is a white wine with a higher alcohol content, “el Malamado Soleria”. It was sweet and very alcohol-y, like a dessert wine.

Soleria dessert wine, Malamado winery.

Zuccardi Q Malbec, our first wine taste test.

After this we headed over to the restaurant to try their famous wines paired with some food. We started with a chardonnay, accompanied by a variety of breads and empanadas. Then, we had the main course with a bottle of malbec, of course. I had a delicious pasta with red sauce and vegetables, and the rest of the group had an assortment of very bloody meats, which is apparently a desirable thing, but I’m still not completely sure why. For dessert, we had some kind of cake with vanilla ice cream and grapes, or tiny plums (it was kind of hard to tell), paired with a dessert wine, the “Santa Julia Tardío”. Delicious.

Mountains in the background of the vineyard.

Course #2: Pasta, vegetables, and a malbec.

Dessert: Cake, vanilla ice cream, and tardío.

The group after our meal, ready to take a nap.

Some picnic baskets, packed with bodega-made olive oil.

We decided to take our café al aire libre, in the garden, and then frolicked around the olive tree grove and made Covergirl commercials, because it was so easy, breezy, beautiful. It was a wonderful day with a great group of people, out in the sun, under the mountains, with wine. Exactly what I expected my life to be like in Mendoza.