So, it’s the 50th anniversary of the Judgment of Paris today.
For those who don’t know of it, but still drink wine, this probably means that you’re a GenXer or younger as even the oldest of us couldn’t legally drink when this tasting event came to pass that supposedly put California on the map and gave the French a spanking. Please do read the Wikipedia article above and it lays out all the ‘shocking’ details of it.
When I mentioned the 40th anniversary back in 2016, I feel there was a lot more ‘huzzah’ about it. The main reason being that a lot of those who participated were still alive and everyone wanted to undoubtedly celebrate it while the livin’ was still good.
Indeed, most everyone who was key to the event has now left us for the open bar in the sky. The biggie in that group was Steven Spurrier who died in 2021. But there have been others such as Mike Grgich in 2023 or winemaker Jim Barrett in 2013. Absolutely all of the judges are no longer with us either, minus Aubert de Villaine who I assume is living his absolute best days given that he’s the co-owner of Burgundy wine icon, Domaine Romanée Conti.
If I sound jaded about the whole affair, it’s because there have been so many wine tastings to honor the original showdown that even I’ve attended one in the past despite having truly zero connection to it other than being from California. And, let’s emphasize that Richard Nixon was from California as well so take from that what you will.
On The Socials I’ve noted that other tasting events have taken place as well to honor this mighty half century. I have to assume they’re all with recent wines or at least far less old than 50+ years given that most all of these wines, even if the ‘winners’ are long over the hill. After all, not every wine can be bulletproof like Madeira.
Despite people going through the motions, I feel now that there’s something of a non-event to the date as my friend and colleague, Henry Jeffreys wrote up, that if the tasting hadn’t taken place, we’d still have ended up in the same state of affairs with Bordeaux coming back, in a big way. Also, maybe things would potentially be better for wine overall as prices for Napa Valley bottles would still be in the ‘somewhat-reasonable’ range instead of absolutely batshit and we wouldn’t see such a backlash against wine which, is largely due to the high prices.
I know one thing is for sure in that had the tasting not happened, we wouldn’t have had the rather crap film, Bottleshock. Alan Rickman was excellent as always in it (despite being nothing like the actual Mr. Spurrier) and we would have been spared James T. Kirk v2 in a very bad blonde wig.
From this point on, I propose that instead of propping up even more tastings on the anniversary, we instead just celebrate the day by opening a bottle of a New World Cabernet Sauvignon (or Chardonnay as per your preference.) Then we can do what we should have been doing all this time and embrace the fruit!
