(Decanter) Pablo Rivero is the sommelier and owner behind award-winning Parrilla Don Julio steakhouse in Buenos Aires. He was named Latin America’s Best Sommelier 2022 in the inaugural prize by the World’s 50 Best in November 2022.

‘Like many Argentines, I have family in Mendoza, so wine was always on the table, at lunchtime and over dinner, at home.’

‘When I started working at Parrilla Don Julio as a 20-year-old, I fell in love with the ageing and cellaring of wines, processes that would transform them into something better: I love playing with the effects of time. And, as soon as sommellerie became a career option, I was part of the first class to study at the Escuela Argentina de Vinos in 2002.’

‘My earliest drinking memory is my grandfather giving me a glass of wine and soda to try, and watching him squirt the fizzy water into the glass. I’d watch those hypnotic and tempting bubbles and always remember that beautiful intense red colour.’ 

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