Gallegos
As I wandered around the tasting last week, I overheard an interesting snippet of conversation regarding Familia Belasco’s recent purchase of vineyards in Mendoza, Argentina. The Argentine vendors thought they had pulled a fast one on the ‘Gallegos’ who had bought the 70 hectare vineyard. (As the English have Irish jokes and the Irish have Kerryman jokes so Argentines refer to Spaniards as ‘Gallegos’, simple fishermen from Galicia.) The old Malbec vines, densely planted in 1919, are very low yielding so, little appreciating that quality outsells quantity every time, the Argentines thought they had duped the purchasers into buying a useless plot of land. The magnificent, rich, powerful Arguentota Malbec 2004 and the huge, purple, chocolaty Swinto Malbec 2005 were testament to the wisdom of the Familia Belasco.
