Uruguay is one of the best-kept wine secrets of South America. This was the proposition I explained during a masterclass on the wines of Uruguay at the Wine Bloggers Conference 2018. Some bloggers in attendance asked for me to share parts of the presentation online, so here are some of the highlights from October’s Masterclass on the Wines of Uruguay and Uruguay’s wine regions.
Why Uruguay is a unique wine country
Uruguay may be one of the smallest countries in South America but it has quite a few big claims to its name. With the largest wine consumption outside of Europe (an impressive 28 litres per capita), wine is always on the menu in Uruguay. And so is beef! Uruguay is the world’s biggest consumer of beef per capita gobbling 124 lbs per capita!
The country isn’t shy of having a good time and Montevideo is believed to be the birthplace of tango and also hosts the world’s longest carnival (40 days). Uruguay was also the first country in the world to entirely legalist cannabis (in 2013) and has an impressive education record with every single child in Uruguay given their own laptop for school since 2009. In terms of sporting prowess, Uruguay was the first country to win the World Cup (in 1930).
While Uruguay can lay claim to many ‘firsts’ in the world, in terms of wine production in South America Uruguay comes fourth in production size (after Argentina, Chile and Brazil).
The wines of Uruguay and its wine regions
How much wine does Uruguay produce?
Uruguay produces 957,000 hectolitres of wine a year, from its 6,562 hectares of vineyards. The majority of Uruguay’s wine production is red (over 80%) with a growing category of white wine production.