California Wines Beat the French

Filed in archive Wine Tasting on May 30, 2006

I reported a short time ago about the wine reenactment in the works.

Well, after a little more squabbling about the particular, such and when and where, they finally go their act together. Unfortunately, the French weren't too thrilled with the outcome.

From the UK Times Online: Eighteen of the world's top wine tasters swirled, sniffed, sipped then spat their way through the same label and vintage of wines first tested in 1976, in what has become known as the "judgment of Paris". The idea was to see if Californian wines had aged as well as the French ones.

To the disgust of the French, the Californians won hands down. A 1971 bottle of Ridge Monte Bello, currently priced at £188, was the overall winner.

The only consolation for the Baroness was that a 1970 Château Mouton Rothschild, currently £136 a bottle, came sixth as the highest placed French wine, even if it was judged against her will. The organisers refused to withdraw it because it had been one of the original wines tasted in 1976.

The Sunday Times carried out its own blind tasting for more affordable wines at Bibendum, the London wine merchants. California again came first. Fans of the film Sideways, about two friends who seek solace from their midlife crises in search of the ultimate pinot noir, will be delighted to learn that a £16.49 bottle of 2004 Morgan 12 Clones Santa Lucia Pinot Noir came top.

Steven Spurrier, a wine writer who staged the original Paris tasting and last week's re-enactment, said: "I can still remember the shock felt by the French at the original event. It changed people's perceptions of new world wine forever.