A taste of Terroir: Uruguay

It’s easy to imagine Uruguay as being high above sea level, but the vast Río de la Plata estuary covers hundreds of miles, lending a maritime influence to many of the country’s vineyards. All along this basin, which is also considered a sea, in case you were in any doubt of its size, it was once believed that there were mountains of silver to be panned from the silt. There were not – but now there is wine.

The clay soils of Uruguay and the warm, wet weather often combined with cooling winds from the coast, give the country’s favoured Tannat grape its deep, berry-rich flavour. Holding on to all that moisture would be a disaster for more delicate grapes, but Tannat yields heavily, weighing its vines down with bunches of fruit so purple and round you’d swear they were decorative props from a 90s Tuscan kitchen. It makes a tannic, astringent wine in inexperienced hands, and the winemakers of Uruguay know to give their grapes time to mature, both in the vineyard and in the barrel.

In the northern regions of the country, the rainstorms can be swift and heavy. Vineyards planted here make the most of the sandy, river pebble soils to help with drainage. In the Metropolitan regions– near the capital city of Montevideo – pink granite deep in the clay soil gives the vines something to struggle against in their search for nutrients, giving the resulting wines more concentration of flavour. 

The maritime climate has led to winemakers in more coastal parts of Uruguay trying their hand at producing Albariño, which once you hear about it, makes complete sense. Albariño loves a rocky, littoral aspect and temperate, oceanic breezes to stop the onset of muggy mildew. So what if Uruguay is thousands of miles from Rías Baixas? Tannat originally came from the French Pyrenees. We’re all travellers on this blue marble, man.