Lots of excitement and modified surprise over the results of last night’s Judgment of Paris II tasting of California wines with top bordeaux and white burgundies.
There were two panels of nine supposedly expert tastings, one in London and one in the Napa Valley, then a further 31 tasters in each location whose scores were gathered separately. (Don't ask me why these particular numbers.)
The original wines tasted in 1976 were mixed up and tasted completely blind. The flights of white wines and younger California Cabernets and red bordeaux were served ‘single blind’ i e we knew which six were from which country and, if we liked, we could look at a list of what they were, but we didn’t know what was in each glass.
Note that the major discrepancy between the US and UK tasters was in our assessment of turbo-charged California wines such as Staglin and Shafer Hillside Select (whose past vintages I have enjoyed but I found the 2001 terribly oaky). My personal tasting notes show how much better the young red bordeaux showed than the young California Cabernets. Shame the Bordelais wouldn’t let us assess them against each other…
