Matias Morcos Moscatel Naranjo Orange Wine

Matias is a young – very young! – winemaker who leads the third generation of a family wine business that was founded in 1950 by Lebanese immigrants. They bought vineyards originally planted by Italians around 70 years previously, at relatively low altitude (600 metres above sea level) some 90 miles east of Mendoza City. This area was home to the original Glory Days of the Argentine wine industry, when domestic consumption quadrupled the levels we see today and the Morcos family, like their neighbours, were entirely focused on producing ‘bulk wine. This they did for more than 60 years until young Matias decided to change the direction of travel.

Despite the subsequent dominance of Luján and, more recently, the Uco Valley in terms of high quality wines, East Mendoza still accounts for a perhaps surprising 42% of the provinces total plantings – a huge vineyard! Matias Morcos has made it his personal mission to shift the focus of the family business away from bulk wine and to hone in on the rich resources he has within his grasp: old pergola-trained vines with an incredible story to tell. He is restoring a 100 year-old winery, refurbishing and dividing old concrete tanks for small-batch production of wines with irresistible character and unique expression. And his winery doors are open to any of his neighbours who feel like joining the advance party.

Moscatel Rosado,

The label depicts an ancient, rudimentary method of viticulture where old immigrant vines have essentially grown feral like ‘little trees’. The task of the grape picker becomes precarious and involves erecting wooden ladders for harvesting amidst wayward branches. This can still be seen in some far-flung pockets of eastern Mendoza as well as in Salta in the far north. The majority of vines for this wine, however, are old pergola-trained characters and in this case, a Criolla varietal called Moscatel Rosado.

Grapes are harvested by hand in to 20kg boxes and aged 6 months in concrete tanks.

Here’s a wine that will make you smile, with its aromas of candied orange peel and runny honey, and hints of exotic flowers; it almost seems to have a hint of botrytis on the nose. The wine is completely dry with flavours of dried citrus fruits and raisins, medium-bodied and floral on the end. Utterly delicious.

Ideal to accompany any type of food, but also moments away from the table.

Nolan - Text from the Spotlight on the White Wines of the America’s Blog

We head South now for our second Argentinian wine, to the province of Mendoza. This is the place of origin you will see for the vast majority of wines from this country. Mendoza is the key hub of wine production in Argentina but the wines are not as homogenous as the sea of Malbecs would lead you to believe. Comparable in size to England, Mendoza has several varied climatic differences within itself, from the highly regarded and equally high altitudes of the Uco Valley, to Lujan de Cuyo closer to Mendoza City itself with its spectacular Andean views and then downhill to the plains of Eastern Mendoza, where Matias Morcos crafts honest wines from lesser seen varieties.

Where appellations such as Lujan and more recently the Uco Valley get all the praise in the modern age, Eastern Mendoza was the home of the original golden age of the Argentine wine industry. Despite the dominance of the prior mentioned regions, Eastern Mendoza still has around 42% of Mendoza’s vine plantings. Much of the crop from here is destined for bulk wine production for domestic consumption which is exactly where the amazing grapes for this wine were destined until very recently.

Matias Morcos is a young wine maker, seriously he looks about 17! He took over his family vineyards and has restored a hundred-year-old winery where he is focusing on quality wine production using various Criolla varieties. Criolla is effectively a blanket term for various local mutations and crossings. The version used in this wine is a Criolla called “Moscatel Rosado”, a pink skinned crossing of Moscatel d’Alexandria and an unknown variety.

With its pale pink skins, making a red wine with this variety is impossible. Stylistically this is still not quite rose either so is categorised as an orange wine. Clean, modern wine making including a six-month aging in concrete tanks has produced a vibrant, gastronomic wine that I find incredibly alluring even as someone who generally does not gravitate to orange wine styles. The flavours are expressive with candied orange peel, runny honey and hints of exotic flowers and almost zero tannin, making this the perfect wine to accompany the earthier spices of North Africa and the Middle East. Serve it up with some simple bread, hummus and baba ghanoush. Experiment pairing with some form of tagine, chicken and apricot would work but when in Marrakech, I had an amazing “sardine meatball tagine” at a wonderful restaurant called Nomad that I would love to recreate with this wine.