The Vineyard at the End of the World: Maverick Winemakers and the Rebirth of Malbec

by Ian Mount

Overview

"The improbable triumph of the humble Malbec—the Seabiscuit of grapes." —Benjamin Wallace, author of The Billionaire's Vinegar

For generations, Argentine wine was famously bad—­oxidized, unpalatable, and often mixed with a low-class French grape called Malbec. But then in 2001, a Cabernet Sauvignon / Malbec blend beat all contenders in a blind taste test featuring Napa and Bordeaux’s finest. Today, Argentina and its signature wine are on the tip of every smart traveler’s tongue. How did this happen?

The Vineyard at the End of the World tells the fascinating, four-hundred-year history of how a wine mecca arose in the high Andean desert. Profiling the outlandish figures who fueled the Malbec revolution—including celebrity enologist Michel Rolland, acclaimed American winemaker Paul Hobbs, and the Mondavi-esque Catena family—Ian Mount describes in colorful detail the nefarious scams, brilliant business innovations, and backroom politics that put Malbec on the map.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393080193
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	01/16/2012
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.40(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Ian Mount has written about wine for the Wall Street Journal, Food & Wine, and other publications. He lives in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Editorial Reviews

Oenophile journalist Mount debuts with a knowledgeable history of the upscale makeover of Argentine wines. Although wine grapes have been planted in Argentina since the 16th century, the beverage produced for centuries was generally cheap, low-quality plonk that only the natives would drink. By the time bodegueros (wine-makers) like Nicolás Catena began trying to upgrade their product in the 1980s, they were also hampered by outdated equipment and methods and unhygienic conditions. Catena and his peers learned from upstart California vintners, who took on the French and won a paradigm-changing 1976 taste test, that it was possible to create high-quality wines outside France. But at first they worked with Chardonnay and Cabernet grapes, wanting to improve Argentina's image with the type of wines everyone considered the best. The humble Malbec grape, almost extinct in its native France but doing well for centuries in Argentina's warmer, sunnier climate, was disdained as coarse and heavy. Yet once Argentina's bodegueros had modernized their facilities and methods to gain a foothold in the international market for fine wines, it was Malbec that gave put them over the top with "a world-class wine--wine that had a sense of place, of terroir." In Mount's savvy recounting, Malbec and the U.S. fine-wine market grew up together; the wine's fruity quality suited American consumers, who were also attracted by its high value-for-money ratio. But many of the American winemakers who rushed into Argentina in the '90s, thinking they could duplicate the locals' success, came to grief over their inability to deal with local business practices, most spectacularly California's Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates. Mount skillfully interweaves multiple story lines and personalities, including foreign consultants like Frenchman Michel Rolland and American Paul Hobbs. Snappily if not elegantly written, this well-informed chronicle captures the distinctive nature of winemaking in a country challenged by an unforgiving climate and political and economic instability.

Kirkus Reviews

[Mount]'s written a book for people who are as interested in Argentina’s culture and history as its wine. That may disappoint Bacchus' most zealous acolytes, but the casual drinker should find the result lively and well-balanced.
—The Washington Post

Mark Jenkins

[Vineyard at the End of the World]… excels at telling the personal stories of struggling and speculation.”

Wine Spectator

Gracefully interweaves history and geography with the harder sciences of agriculture, geography, and chemistry to tell a fascinating story.

Katie Tuttle - Boston Globe

Ian Mount takes wine lovers on an intoxicating adventure. Anyone intrigued by how Argentina has amazed the wine world will love this gripping tale of invention, breakthrough and revelation. I enjoyed this wide-ranging book tremendously.

Vivienne Sosnowski

Ian Mount has found an important void in the current library of wine books: Mendoza and Malbec. The history is fascinating.

George Taber

The Vineyard at the End of the World is a fascinating account of wine-world alchemy: what happens when the old world and the new world meet on the Argentinean frontier. This book will convince you—as if there were ever any doubt—that, for international wine lovers, the golden age is now.”

Tilar Mazzeo

The rise of Argentine wine and the improbable triumph of the humble Malbec—the Seabiscuit of grapes—is one of the great untold stories of globalization. As Ian Mount shows with great energy and feeling, the tale is as much about people and their dreams and obsessions as it is about the delicious drink that motivates them.”

Benjamin Wallace

A definite must-read for Malbec drinkers everywhere, and Argentine wine fans.

Wall Street Journal "On Wine" Blog - Lettie Teague

Gracefully interweaves history and geography with the harder sciences of agriculture, geography, and chemistry to tell a fascinating story.

Boston Globe - Katie Tuttle

A definite must-read for Malbec drinkers everywhere, and Argentine wine fans.

Lettie Teague - Wall Street Journal "On Wine" Blog

A definite must-read for Malbec drinkers everywhere, and Argentine wine fans.— Lettie Teague

Wall Street Journal "On Wine" Blog

Gracefully interweaves history and geography with the harder sciences of agriculture, geography, and chemistry to tell a fascinating story.— Katie Tuttle

Boston Globe