Bodegas Caro ‘Caro’ 2020 Mendoza, Argentina 75cl

Bodegas Caro is one of the wine world’s more intriguing alliances, a joint venture born in 1999 between Domaines Barons de Rothschild (Lafite) of Bordeaux and the Catena family of Mendoza. The name itself fuses the two: CA from Catena, RO from Rothschild.

Caro is the flagship of that project, a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Malbec drawn from high-altitude vineyards at the foot of the Andes. It marries two philosophies: the Catena mastery of Argentine Malbec and terroir, and the Rothschild pedigree in Cabernet and the art of blending. The result speaks of both places at once. The blend leans on Malbec for flesh and Cabernet for frame, with fruit drawn from prized high-altitude districts such as Gualtallary and Altamira in the Uco Valley.

The 2020 vintage comes from a growing season that favoured Mendoza’s elevated sites, where cool nights help preserve freshness and fine tannin. Fruit from these altitude vineyards gives the wine its lift and definition, and the reds of this year carry both ripeness and structure without tipping into heaviness.

Expect a full-bodied, composed red with dark berry and cassis fruit, a savoury, mineral edge and firm, polished tannins. Around eighteen months in French oak, a good part of it new, adds cedar and a fine, dusty grip without masking the fruit. It is built to reward a little patience, and drinks well now with rich food or over the coming years from the cellar. Try it with ribeye, slow-cooked lamb or a mature hard cheese.

This is a wine for the confident drinker who enjoys the meeting of Old World and New, a serious Mendoza red with a genuinely distinctive story behind it.