Blind tastings- the true test

[Aussie Johns]

As a self-confessed wine-bore who attends literally hundreds of tastings in one form or another, it never ceases to amaze me how difficult totally blind tastings can be. No clue whatsoever as to the type or origin of the wine. Certainly a great way to truly discover your ability as a critic of wine.
Most tastings give a hint - eg Bordeaux 2000, McLaren Vale, the Rhone etc., which allows us to "free" our pre-conceived opinions on the area or vatiety. Even wine options substantially narrow the field, and are not really a true test.
So there I was last night, confronted with three wines all decantered, not even the bottle shape (covered in a brown bag) to help. Mein host generously gave me the entire length of the meal to formulate my opinions, so I had a good two hours to reflect on my (constantly changing) estimations.

Wine One
Brilliant crimson. Cherry and strawberry nose, lifted pinot fruit. Wonderfully focussed palate of the above, with what I thought was the calssic "cigar box" finish that I associate with Volnay. Still in the primary phase of development, although the tannins were rounded and not obtrusive. I found this one easy to pick: a 1999 volnay, probably a premier cru. d'Angerville's champans?? Time is on its side.
92pts.........drink 2005-2010+

Wine Two
Dark Cherry red, bricking at the rim. Sweet, perfumed nose with alcohol evident. Palate has dark fruits and a hint of brown sugar, plums and a trace of greeness. Not great, maybe an old merlot. Definitely new world. I'll go for a 1990 Petaluma merlot.
84pts.........drink now

Wine Three
Light Crimson. Lifted, sweet, pinot nose- violets, even apricots, a touch of licquorice. Almost Vosnee-like, but a little too obvious to be Burgundy. New world pinot?? Tannins have melted away, and the seamless palate suggests a fully mature wine. Pretty good, but I have no idea of the origin. I'll go for a ten year old Oregon Pinot. Only had a few of those, but the only region outside Burgundy that produces decent Pinot.
89pts..........drink now-2008

Smiles and smirks from the host as I tender my "educated guesses", I should have been smarter and guessed that this was his chance to dispell my loathing of Aussie Pinot.

The wines were:
One
Domaine Des Lambrays Morey St Denis 1996
Wow!!I have seen this wine about three years ago, and its evolvement over that time has been magnificent. Excellent village wine and a superb purchase at $36 upon release.

Two
Lenswood Adelaide Hills Pinot Noir 1996
Completely fooled by the colour and fullness of this wine. A style of Aussie Pinot that I do not like. No subtelty, rather coarse and simple. This did not surprise me.

Three
Bass Phillip Reserve Pinot Noir 1996
I'll have to admit, this was a pretty good wine, and much better than the other BP reserves I have seen. Still, at almost $200 a bottle, I'll take 5 of the Lambrays, thanks very much!!!
Never-the-less, I was honestly pleased to see what I would consider an admirable effort to re-produce those amazingly fickle wines Burgundy has made so famous.

[Stan]

This is a brilliant tale.

Objective notes and interesting story in the wine styles told.

The Morey sounds like it had great tings to say. And who ever guesses Morey? Ripe, acid year. Power of 1996? Fair valuation to me.

Lenswood? A bit perverse as pinot I think.. More red winey. Not a comment on one vintage but most show the heat and forwardness. Merlot, why not.

Bass Phillip's 1996s are pretty smart. Spicy and complex. And clean. These wines are the reason for the fame.

There are some very admirable Aussie pinots. I believe many vintages need to be tried to conclude where a maker is going with this vintage sensitive grape as I have seen some beautiful balanced and perfumed wines from a maker and in some years the wines are too chunky or lacking harmony. A few cool area makers come to mind who understand and are doing the right things.

The example of the dinner is an excellent one!

[David Lole]

Thanks AJ, I enjoyed this, too.

The '96 Lambrays Morey Village is of interest. I was of the opinion Lambrays was a perennial underachiever or, perhaps at best, variable. Can you assist with any info. on their current form? TIA

[Gavin Trott]

Couldn't agree more, in a different context.

As a retailer its always dangerous to taste wines knowing the labels. Possible problems include

expecting a wine to be good or bad because of its name

wanting a wine to be good or bad because of price/cost profitability etc

being biased because you know and like the owner maker

and many more.

My auswine panel tastes everytihing blind, then are asked to assess the price, what would they be willing to pay for the wine. This is very educational both in terms of the wine, and in terms of value for money.

Just at last night's panel we had two 'cleanskin' discoveries of mine that showed well in some very good company, a new label no one has heard of (yet!!!) as stunning, and a well known and highly respected label as disappointing.

I wonder what their/my reactions would have been if we knew the labels in advance??

[707]

I use weekly to fortnightly (depending on the number of new releases to be tried) blind tastings as the only way to really sort out what's good wine and more importantly unless you're wealthy, whats great QPR.

I meet with 14-15 others faced with 9-10 reds of a particular theme, usually variety in the case of Shiraz and Cabernet, roughly the same price say $20-30. We sit down with the 9-10 glasses in front of us and take an hour to work through the lineup to the point where we vote on our Most Prefered wine, our two placegetters and out Least Prefered wine.

These tastings show several things.

That even a group of experienced palates will often have views so different that someones Most Prefered is someone else's Least Prefered, there is no right and wrong with wine.

That blind is the only way to take all bias, even sub concious bias out of your judgement.

That David's can and surprisingly often do beat the Goliath's.

By making my buying decisions from these tastings I've avoided buying many big guns that just haven't performed that vintage and bought many little known small labels that are now going on to be highly regarded themselves.

My advice is always try the new and small labels. Whilst many are overpriced from the beginning and may be set for a nasty end, many are sensibly priced and outstanding QPR. Blind tastings may be only way to sort through them though.

Good hunting - Steve

[Aussie Johns]

Thanks AJ, I enjoyed this, too.

The '96 Lambrays Morey Village is of interest. I was of the opinion Lambrays was a perennial underachiever or, perhaps at best, variable. Can you assist with any info. on their current form? TIA

David,
Lambrays has gonr from strength to strength from about 1996, although the 95 vintage was also pretty good. Amongst the best "terroir" in Burgundy, it indeed had under-achieved for decades prior to that.
I find the 99's, esp the GC, absolutely stunning, all about power without masses of everything. Perhaps the antithesis of a blockbuster Aussie shiraz (which are also ofter magnificent)
Interestingly, 98 is also a great year for this domaine. The village wine this year was/is a cracker.

[Baby Chickpea]

Nice tale AJ - I am currently working my way through many vintages of BP (Reserve and Premium) from 1994-current. So far, pretty good from the ones I've had.

[David Lole]

Thanks AJ, I enjoyed this, too.

The '96 Lambrays Morey Village is of interest. I was of the opinion Lambrays was a perennial underachiever or, perhaps at best, variable. Can you assist with any info. on their current form? TIA

David,
Lambrays has gonr from strength to strength from about 1996, although the 95 vintage was also pretty good. Amongst the best "terroir" in Burgundy, it indeed had under-achieved for decades prior to that.
I find the 99's, esp the GC, absolutely stunning, all about power without masses of everything. Perhaps the antithesis of a blockbuster Aussie shiraz (which are also ofter magnificent)
Interestingly, 98 is also a great year for this domaine. The village wine this year was/is a cracker.

many thanks for your help

[Aussie Johns]

Had the Bass Phillip Reserve PN 1996 again yesterday, and I once more found it a very impressive wine.
Believe it or not, this was consumed at a picnic with BB-Q pork spare ribs out of a glass tumbler. ( courtesy of a suprisingly-generous brother)

Went really well with the BBQ meat, and retained its Vosnee-like characters despite liberal amounts of charcoal on the ribs.
A very impressive effort, one I would conced to being outstanding, and worthy of 91 points.

Never-the-less, an expensive BBQ quaffer!!

[Sean]

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[Guest]

I wonder what their/my reactions would have been if we knew the labels in advance??

Got another example. There was an article in Sunday's newspaper making that pt. They ran a blind tasting with four wines and one of them of course was the new $400 Grange. None of the tasters liked it at first, it was described as bitter, hard and medicinal. But when the label was revealed it got a lot better all of the sudden. "The Grange really stood out. The more I taste it, the more I like it" one of them said.

Says a lot more about the tasters than the wine in this instance!!!
GW

[Sean]

deleted

[Gary W]

. Maybe the tasters are just a bunch of amateurs, but if they like one wine over another and can say why then you just have to respect that, don't you?

Yes. I can respect that. You like what you like. No problems.
Same as I can respect that people like Fruity Lexia from cask over a 1984 Seppelt Eden Riesling - "I like this one because it tastes sweet and fresh. The other one is a bit dry and flavourless." It does not mean that the Lexia is a "better" wine though by most conventional standards of "Wine Appreciators".


GW

[Davo]

Sean,

I gotta tell you that what the Pennies rep is telling you is a load of manure.

The Grange is lined up at Peel Estate every september against 19 other shiraz from Oz and OS of the same vintage all tasted bling in flights of 5.

Believe me when I tell you that the Grange does not stand out, is bloody hard to pick even by the so called experts at the tasting, and often ranks poorly except when it has seen an exceptional vintage.

[Michael]

I cannot believe a serious taster cannot pick grange, it is a very certain style of wine. Perhaps if they don't know it's there, and it's not showing well maybe it gets a bit lost, but as far as it's manifest quality goes, concentration and vigor of fruit will always stand out. You should be able to pick a very good wine nonetheless, and if shown amongst non OZ wines then it should stand out even more clearly.

I would hazard a guess that these 'tasters' are assessing quality based on how much they like it, not it's actual qualitative characteristics.

M

[Davo]

I cannot believe a serious taster cannot pick grange, it is a very certain style of wine. Perhaps if they don't know it's there, and it's not showing well maybe it gets a bit lost, but as far as it's manifest quality goes, concentration and vigor of fruit will always stand out. You should be able to pick a very good wine nonetheless, and if shown amongst non OZ wines then it should stand out even more clearly.

I would hazard a guess that these 'tasters' are assessing quality based on how much they like it, not it's actual qualitative characteristics.

M

Well Michael you should just hazard away. Tasters at these events include the likes of wine author and judge Peter Forrestal, wine show judges Alan Duneen and Michael Tambouri, various winemakers including Clive Otto and Paul Conti, wine journalist Neville Phillips and many others from within the industry as well as rank amateurs such as myself.

I think you need to do the blind taste test yourself and put the grange against a pile of other high end shiraz before you make assumptions.

[BA]

AJ, great topic. Not knowing the wine before tasting is so important and can bring us so many new ideas about wine.

The one thing I disagree with that's discussed here is trying to pick the great wine out from a large lineup of similar wines. It's often been discussed that if you put together a blind tasting of 10 great Aussie shiraz and threw in a half decent cab, no surprises as to the standout wine.

I first started blind tasting by travelling and visiting cellar doors. The first time I did this, two wines leapt out at me. 1990 Turkey Flat shiraz + 1990 Rockford BP. I had no idea what I was tasting (other than Barossa shiraz) and I lashed out and bought 2 of each (was I young and stupid back then - you bet). The last surviving TF was stunning last year. Both are now regular buys for the cellar. To this day, I will visit a cellar door with no more knowledge than a sign on the road. Sure, you taste a lot of rubbish, but the true gems stand out here.

I find that by having a bite to eat between wines and breaking things up with a sparkling white, a sem, a pinot etc is a very good way of avoiding palate fatigue. I don't know how the show judges can possibly do what they do. Good luck to them.

I am not a regular Grange drinker and the price will always preclude me. I have tried two in recent times. 1989 after a Lions grand final win, and 1998 at a recent dinner. Given a choice now, the 89 wins hands down, as it should. I'd love to try the 98 again in 20 years, but the 89 - a supposed "lesser" vintage, was spot on at 14 years. I'm sure the 98 will be better in time, but I suspect most tasters will vote for the older one every time.

True blind tasting is great - AJ's dinner will attest to that. This is a huge country with a LOT of wineries. Jump on your bike, get out there and try some.


cheers
BA

[Michael]

I cannot believe a serious taster cannot pick grange, it is a very certain style of wine. Perhaps if they don't know it's there, and it's not showing well maybe it gets a bit lost, but as far as it's manifest quality goes, concentration and vigor of fruit will always stand out. You should be able to pick a very good wine nonetheless, and if shown amongst non OZ wines then it should stand out even more clearly.

I would hazard a guess that these 'tasters' are assessing quality based on how much they like it, not it's actual qualitative characteristics.

M

Well Michael you should just hazard away. Tasters at these events include the likes of wine author and judge Peter Forrestal, wine show judges Alan Duneen and Michael Tambouri, various winemakers including Clive Otto and Paul Conti, wine journalist Neville Phillips and many others from within the industry as well as rank amateurs such as myself.

I think you need to do the blind taste test yourself and put the grange against a pile of other high end shiraz before you make assumptions.

Davo,
I think you'll find you're the one making assumptions. I have tasted grange blind many times, amongst often many of the great syrah's of the world. it is not like any of the others.

[KMP]

Thanks, AJ. This IS a very interesting topic. More power to you for even trying to identify the wines without any information on them. There are very few who, by themselves, can correctly identify an individual wine. Most of us just end up being embarrassed by the whole thing, which, I think, is why the options game is so popular.

I wonder if that's being a bit harsh GW. Just because Grange is highly regarded (and a lot of money) doesn't mean you have to like it, especially a young Grange. The pt is it is often surprising how a wine performs in a blind tasting. Maybe the tasters are just a bunch of amateurs, but if they like one wine over another and can say why then you just have to respect that, don't you? I think that's probably more valid than the opinion of someone who gets Grange because of the label or who is just promoting it. Interestingly, the Penfolds rep made a rather barbed comment, "This happens quite often when it's tasted by novices. It's a big, bold wine unlike anything they've tasted." Might be a fair comment actually if you agree that you won't get Grange if you don't usually drink Grange or wines like it. I would think a group of "experts" should be able to pick Grange in a line-up, although often you hear of times when that doesn't happen.

One of the tasters actually works in the industry and I think he might have tumbled to it early on. I mean if a journo came up to you a week after Grange had been released and said, "Here's a line-up up four wines. All Shiraz. Which do you think is the best?" you'd think one of them is probably the Grange. Anyway after the initial impression (not so good) and as time went on he got more interested in it. By the time it was revealed as the Grange though, he was positively gushing over it. One of the other tasters who just didn't like the Grange at all voted for the Jacob's Ck. Another taster agreed the Grange had "more flavours" as time went on, but voted for the Summerfield. And the journo liked the Jacob's Ck best. The fourth wine was the Balgownie and I think one of them said it was a bit young. Now you could say it's not the ideal group of people or the ideal wines to judge the Grange against. But even flawed as it is, maybe this little anecdote raises the question about whether it is the wine or the label that has been talked about lately.

Sean: Very interesting points. I attend a lot of blind tastings. Usually the only information given is the wine style or grape. But sometimes a list (out of order) is provided. At a Penfolds tasting Grange is always easy to pick - for me its almost always the one wine that (when young) is so big its just too much.

But at other tastings where the only clue is that the wines are shiraz (for example) its interesting to see how people rate wines. For a number of years the local wine shop held Saturday group tasting where the group were asked to give our top three wines by a show of hands, and the votes were tallied to identify the group's favorites. It was pretty obvious that novices would go for the wine that was drinking well at that time, whereas the more experienced tasters were voting for those wines they thought were likely to improve with age. On many occasions the guy running the tastings (shop owner who is also a wine judge and very wine savvy) would be asked to explain why he liked the very expensive wine X when the group liked wine W, which often was cheap and quaffable. Was he voting for wine X to try and convince people to buy it? He'd always try to explain that he was assessing the wines for their potential - if we had more experienced tasters than novices in the group he was believed! I'd cop flak because I'd be furiously taking notes during the tasting and people would want to see what I'd written, but I'd always decline by saying that what I'd written was correct only for me and that their impressions were what they should place their faith in. In the end the tasting format was changed so that you come in during Saturday and taste by yourself. One of the reasons given for the change in format was that people didn't like voting because it could be embarrassing!!

Mike

[Davo]

Well congratulations Michael on being the best unpublished picker of Grange in a blind lineup.

Now could you please provide an explaination of this and especially give you definition of what actual qualitiative characteristics I should look out for, apart from the label that is.

I would hazard a guess that these 'tasters' are assessing quality based on how much they like it, not it's actual qualitative characteristics.

M

[Michael]

Well congratulations Michael on being the best unpublished picker of Grange in a blind lineup.

Now could you please provide an explaination of this and especially give you definition of what actual qualitiative characteristics I should look out for, apart from the label that is.

I would hazard a guess that these 'tasters' are assessing quality based on how much they like it, not it's actual qualitative characteristics.

M

Davo,
I am a bit confused are you saying you can't tell or don't know the difference between what you like, and what is good? Perhaps you just like 'telling it like it is', tell it straight so people don't get the wool pulled over their eyes?

If you don't think Grange stands out in an international syrah lineup, I wonder about your experience with these wines.

Now say in a range of Australian wines, that is a little different, but not necessarily that much. I can easily believe out of a range, you might not pick the Grange, however if you come across it and don't find some intrinsic quality characters here, then you would need to reassess your tasting skills. Fineness and shape of tannin, concentration, vigour and intensity of fruit, length, balanced rounded acidity etc etc.

Many people are of the impression that the better wine should always taste better than a lower grade wine - this is a function of time.

So to taste a wine blind, come across the grange say, declare you think it tastes average and not very good, this reflects more on the taster than the wine. No matter the relative merits of the vintage it is always going to be of a certain standard and quality - a skilled taster should be able to recognise that this is a high quality wine with potential.

This anecdote seems to be suggesting that because a group of tasters didn't like the wine blind, then the wine is not as good as it's cracked up to be. Is this your view Davo? are you calling a spade a spade, and telling it like it really is?

Imagine this perspective while barrel sampling a load of unreleased Bordeaux; this lafite is closed, they're poor this year.

Cheers
M

[Michael]

Just to clarify Davo,
I am not suggesting anyone should buy a wine they don't like or weren't impressed with; rather that this is a different thing to "it's not any good".

[Davo]

Michael,

You have made assumptions and judgements concerning a blind tasting and tasters and then say you are confused.

Well buddy, let me tell you I am confused because I really don't know where you are coming from, and I don't think you know either.

If you don't know which wines the Grange was tasted against or who the tasters were or what the scoring system was then I really don't think you can make any form of even semi-intelligent comment. Do you?

And you still have me totally confused and awaiting your definition of quality wine.

[Michael]

Michael,

You have made assumptions and judgements concerning a blind tasting and tasters and then say you are confused.

Well buddy, let me tell you I am confused because I really don't know where you are coming from, and I don't think you know either.

If you don't know which wines the Grange was tasted against or who the tasters were or what the scoring system was then I really don't think you can make any form of even semi-intelligent comment. Do you?

And you still have me totally confused and awaiting your definition of quality wine.

Davo,

I think you just told me all I need to know about you, and the quality of discourse I can expect. you keep on keeping it real.

BTW when I said I was confused, that was a nice way of saying I don't think you have anything valid to say.

cheers
M

[Red Bigot]

Just thought I'd post here as it's not normal to have an inconsquential stoush with personal insults flying like this without an RB involved.