2022 Vina Cobos Hobbs Estate Malbec Agrelo Argentina 3pk 3x750ml

Paul Hobbs came to Mendoza in 1988 to look, not to buy. He'd already made his name in Napa — UC Davis-trained, he cut his teeth under Robert Mondavi, became the first winemaker at Opus One, and served as VP at Simi — but Mendoza's terroir held him. He spent years consulting for Nicolás Catena before putting his own name on anything, and that early groundwork is a big part of why Argentine Malbec now gets taken seriously on the world stage. The first Cobos Malbec was 1999. It remains the wine everything else at this address is measured against.

Hobbs now splits his attention across wineries on three continents — Paul Hobbs Winery and Crossbarn in California, Viña Cobos in Argentina, Crocus in France, Yacoubian-Hobbs in Armenia — plus consulting work across more than 30 estates worldwide. Cobos, farmed sustainably in both vineyard and cellar, is where the Mendoza project lives.

The 2022 is drawn from two estates on opposite sides of the argument. Chañares, in Los Árboles at 1,184 meters in the Uco Valley, supplies 57% — stony alluvial ground, gravel and rounded stone over calcareous sediment, roots that run deep and wide. Hobbs Estate in Agrelo, at 995 meters in Luján de Cuyo, supplies the other 43% off clay-topped soil. Cool altitude against warm clay. That tension is the wine.

Picked by hand between March 17 and April 2. Sorted by bunch, then by berry. Fermented in stainless steel, full malolactic, then eighteen months in French oak with 61% new barrels. Bottled without fining in October 2023.