KEY POINTS:
How do you choose a bottle of wine? By its label, its price or, as in the case of a bizarrely shaped bottle of good verdicchio, because you are drawn to weird design? For most wine drinkers the answer is none of the above. You are most likely
to be drawn to a bottle of wine - apart from its price - by its medal stickers.
Despite the sometimes negative press that wine competitions receive (remember a certain sauvignon blanc late last year?), most are stepping up their integrity.
The 2007 International Wine Challenge (IWC) in London next month will have the biggest ever faults analysis undertaken at a wine competition. This means that any wines the judges think are dodgy will be analysed and rated accordingly.
It's a taste exercise rather than laboratory-based, due to the logistics of putting thousands of wines under the microscope. A conservative approach is taken to the fault-finding so that it is not just one judge's opinion that could decimate a wine's chances of winning something, insists Kiwi winemaker, Master of Wine and IWC co-chairman Sam Harrop, who introduced the fault regime last year.
The IWC is the biggest wine competition in the world and if a wine bottle at your local supermarket or wine store boasts an IWC medal sticker, you can be sure it's been put through its paces before being awarded anything.
Few wine competitions have such rigorous standards but the quality of judging - and of the wines themselves - have risen markedly in this country in the past few decades. In the old days, which is how Royal Easter Wine Show director Terry Dunleavy refers to the 1970s, a bronze medal was a sign that a wine didn't have any obvious faults. It may not have had much merit either, he adds.
The overall improvement in the quality of New Zealand wines means that it is more difficult now than it was back then to get a gold, silver or bronze medal. And a bronze medal awarded at the Royal Easter Wine Show, in its 54th year, means that a wine has positive qualities. As you would hope.
Also worth noting is that judges at the 2007 Royal Easter Show Wine Awards dished out fewer gold and bronze medals this year than last. Despite receiving more wines for judging, only 76 golds were awarded this year compared with 79 last year; bronzes were 502, down from 507 last year. It might not sound like a lot but it reflects the fact that medals are not given out simply for the sake of it.
The other high-profile wine show this month was the Sydney International Wine Competition. Of the 29 gold medals awarded to sauvignon blancs, 26 went to Kiwi wines. The 2006 Spy Valley Marlborough Riesling was awarded the trophy for best riesling. Don't get me wrong, that riesling is a sensational wine (and one of my favourite Kiwi rieslings), but Australia has a track record of producing some of the world's best dry rieslings, so this award reflects the judges' open-mindedness to diversity.
Among the champion trophies given to local wines at the 2007 Royal Easter Wine Show this year, the following wines won best of their type: 2005 Esk Valley Reserve Syrah, 2004 Church Road Reserve Hawkes Bay Chardonnay, 2006 Villa Maria Single Vineyard Seddon Pinot Gris, 2006 Mt Difficulty Target Gully Riesling, 2006 Wooing Tree Rose and the 2005 Trinity Hill Tempranillo.
Check out the full list of medal winners for the 2007 Royal Easter Wine Show at wineshow.co.nz and for the 2007 Sydney International Wine Competition at top100wines.com.