YOUR SERVING - Wine Awards Part 2 - 081225

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back. We are talking everything to do with wine
at the moment, and we have been joined, luckily enough
by Marco Callahan, who is the chief judge for the
snap Printing Royal Hobart Wine Show where we've just had
some winners, and Jeremy Deneen, who is the Royal Hobart
Wine Show Committee Chair, which is a pretty big job.
Now you guys have both been involved in the judging

(00:20):
end of this. A lot of times people think, if
you're going to have awards for something, there's a gold medal,
there's a silver medal, a bronze medal, and then there's
a bunch of people who didn't quite make it. Is
it the same with wine, like there's one of each.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
That is one aspect of the shows that are probably
not that well understood in the general public. Gold, silver,
bronze does not mean positions one, two and three on
the podium. They're a standard, so you know, wine's of
a gold medal standard, of a silver or a bronze
medal standard or no medal standard so often describe it.
There are really only five categories that the wines get

(00:54):
put into. Gold Amazing, which might be less than five
percent of a class silver metal standard, which is you're
very much at the point end they're still So the
silver medal wines were really well liked by the judges.
That might be the top say five to eight percent,
say bronze metal standard. A lot of wines tend to

(01:16):
reach that standard these days because the wines across the
country are so good now that wasn't the case twenty
years ago. And then you know, you've got a sort
of group of wines below that that are sort of
you know, sound and fine and perfectly drinkable and nice.
And then you've got various scores at the bottom below
that that are ones that have got a bit of

(01:37):
a problem.

Speaker 1 (01:37):
Does that mean it's a bit like when you go
to school and you're trying to make like a C,
A B and a KN'TI grade.

Speaker 2 (01:42):
Exactly, that's a good comparison.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
I like that.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
So generally the wines are judged out of one hundred points,
So to win a gold medal you need ninety five
points or more. A silver medal would be ninety to
ninety four points, bronze eighty five to eighty nine. And
like Mark said, like there's a lot of wines that
will not get that get that kind of score to

(02:05):
get even a bronze medal. But if you get an
eighty two point score, it still means that the wines
perfectly sound, perfectly drinkable, and nobody disliked it. It just
perhaps wasn't as interesting or exciting or you know, didn't
capture the judge's attention as much as something that had
maybe more complexity or more generosity.

Speaker 1 (02:26):
So, as a judge, what are some of the things
that stand out to you when you're tasting a wine?

Speaker 2 (02:31):
The sorts of things that separate the good from the
great are things like complexity of flavor and length of flavor.
That's that persistence of flavor on the palette. With a
really good glass wine, you know, you have a mouthful
of that and you can still taste it, that that
flavor endures, it lingers for a while.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
And is it always a case of price point? When
you find out at the end, you're like, oh, well,
I'm not surprised because that one's been valued at eighty
dollars a bottle or one hundred and fifty dollars a bottle.

Speaker 2 (03:00):
Price is driven by a few things, and quality is
one of them. Price is driven by more than just quality,
like it's brand power, it's scarcity and that sort of thing.
So that's why, Yeah, there's a correlation between scores and quality,
but it's a pretty good guide. But clearly there are outlies.

Speaker 1 (03:20):
We've had some winners from within Tasmania within the show here.
I guess one of the big ones that I wanted
to bring up with you is Gala as State emerged
with the best charraz or dry red this year with
their twenty twenty three GALAA State Emerald Charah. I believe
you pronounce it, which is essentially still charaz, Is that right?

Speaker 2 (03:40):
Yeah? Sure ye.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
In Australia we tend to call it churras. In France
they'd call it sirah.

Speaker 1 (03:48):
So when you've got something like this that emerges from
an area that we're known for cool climate wines and
things like charaz is a warm climate wine, so this
can't be a usual thing that they've picked up an
award for best dry red.

Speaker 2 (04:00):
So it's certainly the case that you know, many years
ago that everybody would have fallen off their chair for
Tasmanian shuras did well at a show that just wasn't
That was pretty rare sharaz is one of those things
that does very well across the country, you know, from
Canberra to the Barossa to McLaren Vale. Great Western Tazzy
hasn't really been on the radar until relatively recently. It's

(04:22):
popping up more and more consistently with sharazas that are
they're standing up and going, hey, yeah, look at me.

Speaker 3 (04:31):
It's a much smaller part of the sort of viticultural
landscape in Tasmania. There's a handful of places that are
actually warm enough in the state to ripen it and
it's I can't remember off the top of my head.
It's probably less than two percent of the total vineyard area,
maybe less than one percent, but it has been doing well,
particularly in warm spots like the East Coast, some pockets

(04:51):
of the Tamar and some pockets of the Cole River Valley.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
We'll come back and we'll talk a little bit more
about wine. We're are having a chat today with Marco
Lahan and Jeremy Denean with the Royal Hobart Wine Show.
That hasn't just been This is seven eighth ifm