Aaand More Vino

If yesterday was about wine and food, today was about food and wine.

We started off with a morning tour of Lopez bodega. While waiting for our tour to begin, we drank a glass of their sparkling wine at, I kid you not, 10 a.m. We then watched a short film on the century-old winery and began our tour. A couple of things made this bodega different. For one, it was absolutely huge. Someone described it as a movie set, which is appropriate. There were multiple buildings that each housed something different. In one building was the machinery, which bottled, corked, and labeled the wine. In another building were the HUGE oak barrels that the wine fermented in for a few years, but their secret was they were still using the original barrels, which, he said cost about $30,000 US. We then returned to the main tasting room, where we tried a spicy red wine that none of us were crazy about (our tour guide even said that it wasn’t his favorite wine. Why he chose that for us to taste is beyond me…). 

We then continued to the second winery, Zuccardi bodega, which was gorgeous and rustic. There was a gift shop where they sold wine-based products, such as wine perfumes, bath salts, and lotions. There was an art gallery inside, which our tour guide (who was from California) told us that the artists had come to the bodega last year and picked grapes. After the wine from their grapes has been bottled, a picture of their artwork will be placed on the bottle in order to incorporate art and wine. We then toured the rest of the bodega, but the real treat was the wine tasting. Our tour guide was beyond knowledgeable and taught us the proper basic techniques of examining, smelling, and tasting wine. Although I couldn’t quite taste everything he was suggesting (buttery popcorn? Yeah, my palette is not quite developed enough for that yet), I learned the different parts of the tongue used to taste, and I could distinguish the progression of flavors on my tongue.

And then. Lunch at the bodega. I have never eaten so much food in my life. Thanksgiving doesn’t even compare. Since there’s no way I can communicate the magnitude of the food through text, I think my best bet is just to list it and let you be amazed for yourself. We started off with bread and white wine. Then a pea soup. Then beef, cheese, and onion empanadas. Then grilled vegetables. Then salad. Then red wine. Then chorizo and blood sausage. Then beef. Then pork. Then chicken. Then goat. Then a beef rib. Then a sweet  white dessert wine. Then a cheese-y marmalade-y dessert. Then a sweet red dessert wine. Then pastries. Then coffee.

It was comical how much food there was. The only thing we could do was smile (we couldn't laugh in fear of explosion). Two or three hours after we started, we waddled out of the restaurant (which was absolutely gorgeous, by the way). Then, we came back to the hotel and took a much needed siesta. It’s my personal belief that I fell into a legit food coma because I was dead to the world. But Kara and I forced ourselves to wake up so we could go back to the square and pick up some more goodies. 

Tomorrow, we have an early day because we’re going up to the Andes Mountains. I’m sooo excited, even if it is supposed to be -5 degrees Celsius, and that’s just on the ground; there’s no telling how cold it will be in the higher altitudes. But I’m ready. I brought a scarf and some gloves with me, and I just bought a headband to keep my ears fairly warm. It should definitely be fun, though.