Alta Vista "Premium" Salta Torrontes 2006

The 2006 Alta Vista "Premium" Torrontes offers a unique and tasty alternative to Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, and the world's other, more commonplace white wines. It also provides a needed break from the homogenization and parochial approach adopted by many New World producers, who deem it their duty to transform nearly every white variety into a Chardonnay look alike or at the very least a fat, full, highly oaked affair. In the case of the 2006 Alta Vista Torrontes, there is no such pretense. This is a wine that is not afraid to stand and deliver, and to express the fullness of the Torrontes variety. The 2006 Alta Vista Torrontes offers a lovely bouquet of rose petal, lichee and delicate spice, which are followed by a mouth full of ripe fruit and an exuberant, long dry finish. This is a dry white wine that reminds us that dry does not mean desiccated or artificially acidified to offset overripe fruit. We suggest serving the 2006 Alta Vista Torrontes well chilled (35°- 40° F) in hot weather or slightly less frigid (about 45° F) where more spring like weather prevails. Enjoy!

The 2006 Alta Vista "Premium" Torrontes is a fun warm weather wine that craves food. We can recommend it with everything from plates of fresh apples and double cream cheeses to Chinese classics. A vegetable stir-fry, spring rolls, and other moderately spiced Asian dishes provide excellent companions to Torrontes. The Alta Vista Torrontes is a natural foil to Vietnamese and Thai offerings, especially those dishes that have been prepared with lemongrass. Traditional American and Mediterranean white and red bean dishes will more than do this wine justice, too. However, we must also put a plug in for the endless variety of Spanish style appetizers known as tapas. We also like to serve the Alta Vista Torrontes with a ripe avocado that has been stuffed with baby shrimp. Yum!

Alta Vista is a family owned winery in the sprawling province of Mendoza, Argentina's largest and most important region of viticulture. In fact, winemaking is the Mendoza's only important industry. Here in the mighty Mendoza, in the foothills of the towering Andes at an elevation in excess of 3500 feet, and in Salta, the D'Aulan family cultivates the finest and most traditional of Argentina's grape varieties: Torrontes and Malbec. From the D'Aulan's pristine vineyards, many of which date from the 1940's, flow some of Argentina's most interesting and individual wines. And like all of the best hillside vineyards in Argentina, Alta Vista uses the pure melting snows of the Andes to water its vineyards. In the Mendoza as in most other prime vineyard areas of Argentina, rainfall is all but non-existent, but then again so are rot, mildew, and the multitude of insects and vine diseases that afflict most other wine regions worldwide. At Alta Vista, which means high view, the grapes ripen slowly but completely due to the high elevation and the sunniest weather of any viticultural area on earth. Given the quality of the wines that Alta Vista has been fashioning in the last half dozen years, we have much to enjoy now from this winery and a great deal more to look forward to in the years to come.