🍇Modern influence

The wine, though, is only half of it. The way Argentines drink is also Italian.

The famous Argentine asado may be a New World institution, but the meal around it is profoundly Italian. Pasta is everywhere: tallarines (fettuccine), ravioles (ravioli), ñoquis (gnocchi). One of the country's most charming traditions, Ñoquis del 29, sees families serving gnocchi on the 29th of every month, with a banknote tucked under the plate for good luck — a custom of pure Italian folklore, fully Argentinized. The breaded milanesa steak is a direct descendant of Milan's cotoletta. Aperitivo — the pre-dinner drink — is a habit Italians brought and Argentines embraced. The coffee culture of Buenos Aires, Mendoza and the rest is an Italian inheritance.

And there is something subtler still. Italians don't drink wine to evaluate it; they drink it with food, easily, as part of life. That attitude — wine as table companion, not status object — is very Argentine. It is one of the most likable things about drinking wine in this country, and it is straight out of Piedmont.