What do you look for when judging a wine? The smell, the taste, the mouthfeel? All that and so much more. We look for aromatic, textural and finish qualities, freshness and brightness to the fruit characteristics and how it aligns with the varietal or blend it is meant to be. We look for the maturity of the tannins, how smooth it is, and if it’s an oak-aged wine, how authentically expressive the oak in it is. We’re also looking for the flaws, like bitterness, a tinfoil feel on your teeth, a high level of acid or a wet dog or moldy taste. You can get very earthy notes that can be an attractive component to many wines, especially to reds, but if it passes a threshold, it becomes very unattractive. Sometimes, though, when something’s a little over the top, it comes off really elegant and fun and that can be awarded highly because it’s unique, it’s courageous, it’s risky—and the risk paid off. Why do you swirl and slurp the wine? After you swirl it, these streaks go down the glass. They can tell you how much alcohol and texture the wine has. Swirling also exposes aromatic compounds into the glass. So, when you put your nose in it, you pick up more of the true aromas. Then, when you (taste it), you need to pull the air past the wine on your palate and it makes a little gurgling sound. What you’re doing is you are bringing the aromas up into your nasal passages and cavities to get a full understanding of what’s there. What is your biggest challenge to wine judging? It’s quite an emotional drain for me. After the work I do in a six-hour day of wine judging, I am more exhausted than if I worked three days straight, 14 hours a day during a harvest. I agonize over the fact that a career winemaker has submitted a product into the California State Fair, the granddaddy of all wine judging in the United States, and then we’re supposed to say it’s crummy or it’s great, it’s a gold, bronze or no medal. This is their life work in our hands! I judge wine as if I were the person being judged—what would I want that judge to be thinking about and working very hard to accomplish?
Wine entries, above, are ready to be tasted by judges during the California State Fair Commercial Wine Competition. Nick Karavidas, left, a longtime judge in the competition, sniffs a red wine before tasting it. He says the aroma can tell a lot about a wine’s quality. Below, judges write down their scores.
Linda DuBois ldubois@californiabountiful.com
MORE ONLINE Learn more about what happens behind the scenes at wine competitions at californiabountiful.com.
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