Argentina Everywhere!

**Full disclosure: These wines came to me courtesy of Vine Connections and BinEndsWine. However, I buy the Crios Torrontes all the time at Costco and Whole Foods.**

Argentina seems to be steadily taking hold of my wine life. It started when my boyfriend went to Argentina for a couple of weeks in 2007 and came back incredibly excited about malbec... and this is a guy that used to drink nothing but riesling. Then, the group at Vine Connections had myself, lovely Luscious Lush Thea, and Lisa the Brix Chick for an interesting evening full of Argentinian wines, Japanese sakes, and geeking out (check out their synopsis of the evening here and here). As if that wasn't enough, Argentina then proceeded to take over Taste Live (and Twitter, for that matter) for the entire month of September. Crazy! Here are a few of the tasting notes and comments from my recent Argentinian inundation:

• Reginato 'Celestina'- a gorgeous sparkling rose of malbec. I love anything out of the ordinary and sparkly, so this was a treat. It conveyed a lot of the big body I had come to associate with malbec, with a long finish full of cherry, strawberry, and floral notes.
• Crios- It seems like these guys can do no wrong. First the Torrontes, a minerally, stone-fruit-filled bargain that I find myself buying over and over again to bring to parties. And then my Taste Live box shows up with a bottle of the Syrah/Bonarda. This stuff is a hedonistic indulgence: all fruit, mineral, and raw meat. Both of these bottles retail under $20, which blows my mind. Doesn't surprise me that Crios was Wine & Spirit's Value Brand of the Year in both 2004 and 2007.
• BenMarco- this malbec is my kind of wine. Chewy, dark, almost fleshy with coffee notes and great acidity. Again, ridiculous value and way more fun than my usual Cab Sauv.

So, what are my thoughts on Argentinian wine? First of all, what a crazy value. I'm paying way too much for my Californian wine. Second of all, Ed Lehrman of Vine Connections has my dream job. Third, I'm working on booking a snowboarding-and-winery-visiting trip to Argentina.

The verdict? Drink me. I didn't write about the wines I didn't like. But there are amazing values to be had, which I think everyone should try to snap up before they figure out they could be charging a lot more for this yummy, yummy juice.