Chato's Wine Bar — Restaurant in Municipio de Cafayate

I needn’t have gone to Cafayate’s wine museum earlier in the day because the host of Chato’s wine bar has all of the areas wine history and knowledge stored in his mind! Chato is a former college teacher, speaks excellent English and after retiring opened his wine bar and perused his hobby of wine by passing on his impressive knowledge to customers who frequent his wine bar. He has a choice of several ‘flights’ of wine depending upon your taste or preference. The cost is a reasonable 16500 pesos for six tastes of various wine. Chato will talk you through each wines terroir, history in the area and more. Throw a question at him and he’ll have the answer. I was lucky because when I visited, I was his only customer so we chatted like friends and got on with each other tremendously. And isn’t that what’s wine about? Bringing people together in a social context whether it be at meal time or just having a drink. Visit Chato’s Wine Bar - you won’t be...

We decided to end our tastings here for the day. What an amazing experience. In fact, better than all the tastings combined. Chato is a wealth of knowledge. He is a man of his craft, and since it's his passion, he really loves talking about wine, which was wonderful for us. He actually has the education and certification to show for it (he is in fact a sommelier proper). We got two tastings of rose and red wine and a combo of white, rose and red. With the last wine, a wine chato has made himself, a Malbec. Chato was wonderful, patient with our questions and explained everything. I highly recommend going here first, before your tastings, and then decide which ones you...

Fantastic evening at Chato’s the other night. Chato himself (a nickname given in his youth!) is an amazing character, speaks impeccable English and is an incredibly warm and welcoming host. We genuinely think he might be the nicest person we’ve met in 4 months travelling.

We had two glasses of wine each and a sharing platter before being treated to a free glass of a special home-grown wine (only 1000 bottles produced ever!) as it was the 14th anniversary of the opening of the bar.

It’s a small place but Chato tells us deliberately so, such that he can attend everyone personally.

Do yourself a favour - give this place a visit, you...