Saurus Pinot Noir, Patagonia 2024

Patagonia is Argentina's cool-climate wine frontier — a windswept, high desert region where freezing nights and intense sun mark it out as different. More comparable to New Zealand's Central Otago or Australia's Tasmania than Argentina's warmer Malbec country. This has all the classic characteristics of good value southern hemisphere Pinot Noir – ripe strawberries and raspberries, soft tannins and a hint of vanilla that makes it easy drinking all rounded off with a mineral, saline edge – the marker of Patagonia.

Light enough to drink on its own, but goes well alongside grilled salmon too — the soft tannins and bright acidity won't overpower the fish.

Right in the heart of Patagonia, Familia Schroeder are one of the main players involved in the revival of Patagonian cool-climate winemaking around the start of the 2000s. Their Saurus range is named for an authentic paleontological discovery: a new dinosaur species was unearthed during the winery's construction in 2002 and is preserved on-site to this day. In the remote, wind-scoured desert terroir — with its cool nights, intense sunlight and stark diurnal swings — Schroeder are skilled at the sort of wines that have put Patagonia alongside Central Otago and Tasmania among the southern hemisphere's compelling cool-climate regions.