With wine competition season in full swing, it might be fun to look how Sonoma County holds up against the rest of the state, country or wherever. I can use the recently completed West Coast Wine Competition for illustration purposes. First, why would a winery even enter a wine competition? The obvious answer is for the publicity if they win a gold or silver medal. I think today most wineries think (and it’s true) that a bronze medal is about as exciting and news-stirring as kissing your sister, so maybe they don’t even want the medal.
Every competition has its own standards it would like to reach. I personally think that awarding about 10 percent golds is a good ratio. Wines are getting better every year, and I was just told recently that there’s absolutely no excuse for making a bad wine, even in a bad weather year, given the technology that’s available. Winemakers who are too naïve, stupid or whatever else and don’t take advantage of the technology are simply playing Russian Roulette. I’m not saying that all wines should be golds, but there should never be real disasters. I sometimes wonder how someone would even be dumb enough to enter some of the wines we get. “It smells like the Boston Harbor at low tide,” is one of my favorite comments from Chuck Mara of New York, who has one of the best palates in the country. Other favorites probably shouldn’t be referenced here.
The West Coast Wine Competition had more than 800 entries from across the entire West Coast. Few wineries from Oregon ever enter anything, and God only knows why, since they can use all the help they can get. Many Washington wineries enter and usually do extremely well. It’s probably the biggest sleeper in the national wine scene with some wonderful red wines (all except Zinfandel, which we reserve all bragging rights for in Sonoma, but watch out for Lodi). And Washington’s Rieslings are also world class.
In the Best of Class category, Sonoma was fairly well represented in reds with the Robledo Family Winery (Sonoma) getting two and Rodney Strong (Healdsburg), Broadway Vineyards (Sonoma), LeBaron Ranch (Chateau Diana, Healdsburg), Acorn (Healdsburg) and Fog Crest (Sebastopol) each having one best of class wine. In white wines, Sonoma County got its butt royally kicked: no BOC wines.
If we go one step further, we find that, of 66 total gold medal wines, Sonoma County won only 10. I say “only,” because we talk like we’re the best in the world but in blind tastings we don’t seem to do very well. The one really good thing about the Sonoma County Harvest Fair Wine Competition is that only Sonoma County wineries enter, so you can’t get beat by other areas…only your peers.
Did you ever notice that some of the biggest names in the county don’t even enter the Harvest Fair? They aren’t boycotting but rather are afraid they might be proven to not be the king of the mountain (a legend in their own mind). If you think I’m wrong, look at the entry list of the SCHF and compare it with a list of wineries in the county. Where are the big names? Maybe losing would hurt sales more than winning might help them.
When looking at entries in any given competition, you’ll see the real big boys (like Gallo, Bronco and Franzia), who can use any medals to their marketing advantage, since the real wine snobs wouldn’t drink “those” regardless, while the average consumer, who we as an industry should be addressing, does pay attention to these things as shelf talkers and writer comments. As an example, Gallo entered more than 80 wines, or nearly 10 percent of the total, and earned two Best of Class, one double gold, six golds, 22 silvers and 23 bronze medals. Were they all the E & J Gallo label? No! The entries included multiple wines from Ballatore, Barefoot Wine & Bubbly, Bella Sera Wines, Bodega Elena de Mendoza, Carlo Rossi, Gallo Family Vineyards, Liberty Creek, Madria Sangria, McWilliam’s Hanwood Estate, Peter Vella, Pölka dot, Red Rock Winery, Redwood Creek, The Naked Grape, Tisdale Wines and Turning Leaf Vineyards. Your next question should be: “Where are their heavy hitters?’” And, the answer is that maybe they also don’t want to take a chance on getting beat.
When taking all of the BOC wines to judge for overall best wines (red, white, sparkling, dessert and similar overview categories), there are always a few surprises, and this year was no exception. The Best Red, for example, was Mouvedre from Naggiar Vineyards & Winery in the Sierra Foothills. The surprise to me was that it really didn’t taste like a delicate Mouvedre should. It was big and bold with a few Portish overtones—a typical characteristic of warm area Foothill wines. Not bad, just different.
OK, check out the winners and include some in your bottle-a-day program. I’ll talk to you next month.
