Patch Blogger Named to Sonoma County Harvest Fair Judges' Panel

Sonoma County Harvest Fair has assembled a high-profile roster of wine judges for its 2011 Professional Wine Competition, now in its 37th year.

That includes William Allen, Healdsburg Patch wine blogger, and author of the blog SimpleHedonisms.

Wine professionals from across the United States (and one from Hong Kong) will travel to Santa Rosa to judge Sonoma County wines entered in the Harvest Fair, the nation’s largest regional wine competition.

  Judges will take on the task of swirling, sniffing, sipping and comparing more than 1,000 wines.

The 2011 judges are:

• William Allen, Blogger, SimpleHedonisms.com, Fulton, Calif.
• Dan Berger, Syndicated Writer, Creaters Syndicate, Santa Rosa, Calif.
• Carl Brandhorst, President, Atlantic Seaboard Winery Association, Fairfax, Va.
• Patrick “Chip” Cassidy, Wine Director and Professor, Miami, Fla.
• Jeanne Christie, Wine Editor, Arizona Gourmet Living Magazine, Tucson, Ariz.
• Jill Ditmire, Owner, Mass Ave. Wine Shoppe and President, jad Productions, Indianapolis, Ind.
• Mike Dunne, Freelance Writer, Sacramento Bee, Sacramento, Calif.
• Traci Dutton, Sommelier, Culinary Institute of America, St. Helena, Calif.
• Dr. Barry Gump, Professor of Beverage Management, Aventura, Fla.
• Dr. Hildegard Heymann, Professor/Enologist, University of California at Davis, Davis, Calif.
• Ellen Landis, Owner/Sommelier, Landis Shores Oceanfront Inn, Half Moon Bay, Calif.
• Ken Landis, Owner/Chef, Landis Shores Oceanfront Inn, Half Moon Bay, Calif.
• Paul Lukacs, Wine Writer and Educator, Washington Times, Baltimore, Md.
• Charles Mara, President, The Mara Wine Group, Pound Ridge, N.Y.
• Debra Meiburg, MW, Wine Educator and Writer, Hong Kong
• Deborah Parker-Wong, Northern California Editor, The Tasting Panel Magazine, San Francisco, Calif.
• Dr. Gerry Richie, Director of Enology, California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo, San Luis Obispo, Calif.
• Kent Rosenblum, Winemaker/CEO, Rock Wall Wine Company, Alameda, Calif.
• Tammie Ruesenberg, Lead Sommelier, Olives Bellagio, Las Vegas, Nev.
• Christopher Sawyer, Sommelier, Carneros Bistro, Petaluma, Calif.
• Ronald Siragusa, Wine Director, Kuleto's Italian Restaurant, San Francisco, Calif.
• Fred Tasker, Wine Columnist, Miami Herald, Miami, Fla.
• Marguerite Thomas, Travel Editor, The Wine News, Baltimore, Md.
• Greg Walter, Editor and Publisher, The Pinot Report, Sonoma, Calif.
• Wilfred Wong, Buyer, Beverages and More, Concord, Calif.

(Full biographies of each judge are available at www.harvestfair.org)

West Coast wine judging style
Bob Fraser, owner of winejudging.com and an agribusiness and wine studies instructor at Santa Rosa Junior College, has served as the Professional Wine Competition coordinator for the past nine years. His role includes securing the panel of judges and facilitating the judging process.

“We’re especially pleased with the outstanding caliber of professional wine judges for the 2011 Sonoma County Harvest Fair,” says Fraser. “This year’s judging panel has a higher percentage of judges residing outside of Sonoma County than in previous years. There will be approximately 11 out-of-state judges, and 14 judges from within California, most residing outside of Sonoma County.”
 
The West Coast style of wine judging is a collaborative effort, by a panel of five or more judges with varied backgrounds, including media, education, trade, food and tourism. Each panel member brings a different perspective and set of values to the judging process, shaped in part by the sector he or she represents.

The “educator” panelist is usually a chemistry, enology or wine professor from an academic institution who can recognize flaws and major defects in wine. Panelists with media, trade, food or tourism backgrounds also have excellent wine palates, and are particularly tuned into consumer tastes and preferences within the marketplace.

In a blind-taste setting, the panelists taste the wines and independently select medal winners. The panel facilitator then generates a discussion among the judges to secure a consensus on final award placement.

The West Coast style of judging was originated by the Sonoma County Harvest Fair with the assistance of University of California enology professors.

About this year’s judging
All of the judges will gather Sept. 21 through 23 for three days of blind tastings. All wines entered must be made with grapes grown in Sonoma County, with a Sonoma County-designated American Viticultural Area as the only region listed on the label.

The panelists will designate each wine as a double gold (unanimous), gold, silver, or bronze medal wine, or will specify that the wine receives no award. In each entry class, the judges choose a best of class wine – a wine that best exemplifies the desired characteristics of that class. All 40 best of class winners advance to the sweepstakes round.

The three sweepstakes categories are: red, white and specialty wine (dessert, rose or sparkling). New this year, the Harvest Fair awards will be announced during an industry-only event, the Sonoma County Wine Awards Dinner, on Saturday, September 24 at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds Grace Pavilion.

The sweepstakes winners will take home one of three awards: The George Cooke Memorial Award for the winning red, the James Guymon Memorial Award for the top white, and the Mike Lee Memorial Award for the best specialty wine. The winemaker of each sweepstakes-winning wine will receive a Waterford crystal claret decanter.

Tickets for the industry’s Sonoma County Wine Awards Dinner are $100 per person or $800 for table of eight. Tickets include a souvenir glass, a reception featuring sparkling wines, and a four-course dinner prepared by top Sonoma County chefs. For information about the awards night, go to: www.harvestfair.org/gala.php.

About the Sonoma County Harvest Fair
The Sonoma County Harvest Fair is Friday, Saturday and Sunday, Sept 30 through Oct. 2. It’s a three-day celebration of the bountiful Sonoma County and Wine Country lifestyle with winemaking, delicious cuisine, wine tasting and sales, wine seminars, an art exhibition and sale, ongoing jazz performances, the World Championship Grape Stomp (and more than a dozen qualifying stomps), microbrew tasting (Saturday only), and farm and harvest agricultural activities for children and adults.

Among the new events this year is the “Grand Tasting” on Friday, Sept. 30 for the public. The Grand Tasting is 5:30 to 8 p.m. on opening day of the three-day Harvest Fair. Tickets to this event provide unlimited tastings of the award-winning wines (one-ounce pours) and cuisine, as well as entrance to the Harvest Fair that day.

For more information about the wine judges and the Sonoma County Harvest Fair, please visit www.harvestfair.org. Facebook users can find the latest information and become a fan at www.facebook.com/sonomacountyharvestfair.