Veteran wine critic Jon Bonné and relative newbie Derrick Schneider donned white lab coats last week to serve as judges in the annual San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition in Cloverdale — dubbed the largest competition for American wines in the world — and each has lived to tell the tale on his blog. For Bonné, who’s old hat at these things, it was a relief to be “mercifully spared the long Chardonnay slog — the category infamous among wine judges for being the malolactically-enhanced equivalent of water torture.” But for first-time judge Schneider (who got saddled with said slog on a white-focused panel), the stalwart seriousness he applied to his task is palpable in his recap.
“How do you evaluate a wine in about 30 seconds? I look for fruit in a young wine, but not too much… everything has to be in the context of the wine and the stated goal of the competition: helping consumers find good wines. You don’t knock a Grenache for being fruity. You don’t complain that a dessert wine isn’t dry. I gave high marks to an oaky Chardonnay because it was well-made and balanced: I might not drink it, but lots of the drinking public would.
“On it went for my panel, for three days, across a range of wines: 16 semi-dry sparklers, 10 sweet sparklers, 76 white blends, eight red wines made from native grapes, 11 red wines from hybrid grapes, 48 Brut sparklers, 69 Chardonnays in the $25-$30 range, 19 white wines made from hybrid grapes, 45 dry rosés, 42 Tempranillos, and nine fruit wines.”
Personally, our tongues dry up after visiting two wineries, so spitting or not we’re not sure we could have made it through the final sweepstakes round in which all the judges taste all the best-in-class wines across all categories. But hey, it’s nice work if you can get it.
The public tasting portion of the event happens on February 20th at Fort Mason. Order tickets here.
Behind the Scenes at the SF Chronicle Wine Competition [An Obsession With Food]
Checking Out the (Chronicle) Competition [The Cellarist]
And the Winners Are… [WineJudging.com]
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