{"id":2035,"date":"2017-08-30T09:22:43","date_gmt":"2017-08-30T13:22:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/?p=2035"},"modified":"2024-04-21T16:40:03","modified_gmt":"2024-04-21T20:40:03","slug":"judging-2017-nc-state-fair-wine-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/judging-2017-nc-state-fair-wine-competition\/","title":{"rendered":"Judging at 2017 NC State Fair Wine Competition"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We spent the weekend of August 18th-20th at the <a href=\"http:\/\/ncviticulturecenter.surry.edu\">Shelton-Badgett Center for Viticulture and Enology<\/a> at\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/surry.edu\">Surry Community College<\/a> in Dobson, NC for the <a href=\"http:\/\/ncstatefair.org\">North Carolina State Fair<\/a> Wine Competition. \u00a0This was our first time ever judging a wine competition. \u00a0We were honored to have been chosen to be part of the panel of judges which included media, bloggers, educators, and Certified <a href=\"http:\/\/www.americanwinesociety.org\">American Wine Society<\/a> Wine Judges.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>For an overview of the changes for this year&#8217;s competition go our previous blog post <a href=\"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/nc-state-fair-wine-competition\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h1>Opening Reception<\/h1>\n<p>The weekend kicked off Friday night with an Opening Reception in Dobson. \u00a0This was our first visit to the Shelton-Badgett Center. \u00a0The building is absolutely beautiful. \u00a0Its decor is wine inspired. \u00a0From the &#8220;barrel stave&#8221; ceiling to the &#8220;wine bottle&#8221; lights overhead, the Grand Hall where we were located certainly set the mood. \u00a0The opening reception gave us a chance to meet the other judges, enjoy some <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ncwine.org\">North Carolina Wine<\/a>, have some good food, and hear details of the competition.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h1>Competition Breakdown<\/h1>\n<p>The competition was really six competitions. \u00a0The categories were:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Best Bunch Wine (Vinifera\/Hybrids) &#8211; Amateur<\/li>\n<li>Best Muscadine Wine &#8211; Amateur<\/li>\n<li>Best Fruit\/Honey Wine &#8211; Amateur<\/li>\n<li>Best Bunch Wine (Vinifera\/Hybrids) &#8211; Commercial<\/li>\n<li>Best Muscadine Wine &#8211; Commercial<\/li>\n<li>Best Fruit\/Honey Wine &#8211; Commercial<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Judges were divided into four groups. \u00a0Each group received a different set of wines. \u00a0Wines were judged on their own merits in flights of four to nine wines. \u00a0Thus wines were not compared to each other. \u00a0They were scored using the American Wine Society 20 Point Scale and rated for:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Appearance (Max of 3 points)<\/li>\n<li>Aroma\/Bouquet (Max of 6 points)<\/li>\n<li>Taste (Max of 6 points)<\/li>\n<li>Aftertaste (Max of 3 points)<\/li>\n<li>Overall Impression (Max of 20 points)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For more information on this scale, go check out this <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=dgjnRmRnsQI&amp;feature=youtu.be\">video<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Medals were awarded as follows:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>18-20 Points: \u00a0Would you buy a bottle, keep in a cellar, and share with friends? &#8211; Gold<\/li>\n<li>15-17 Points &#8211; Would you buy a bottle and drink? &#8211; Silver<\/li>\n<li>12-14 Points &#8211; Would you have a glass? &#8211; Bronze<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Double Golds were awarded to wines which received a Gold Medal rating from all judges in the panel.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_2041\" style=\"width: 235px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-2041\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-2041\" src=\"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_0514-225x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"225\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_0514-225x300.jpg 225w, http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_0514-113x150.jpg 113w, http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_0514.jpg 768w, http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_0514-687x916.jpg 687w, http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_0514-414x552.jpg 414w, http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_0514-354x472.jpg 354w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 225px) 100vw, 225px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-2041\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">2017 NC State Fair Wine Competition<\/p><\/div>\n<h1>Saturday Competition<\/h1>\n<p>Saturday morning kicked off around 9am with a wine to cleanse our palates. \u00a0Of course, the entire day was swishing and spitting. \u00a0We started with the amateur competition and finished that by midday. \u00a0The afternoon kicked off with commercial white bunch grape wines (vinifera and hybrids) for some tables. \u00a0Other tables started with ros\u00e9s or even reds. \u00a0We did 5-7 flights that afternoon. \u00a0By the end of the day, our palates were tired. \u00a0We wrapped up around 5:45pm and headed for the hotel.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h1>Saturday Night Dinner<\/h1>\n<p>Saturday evening we were bussed to dinner at Harvest Grill at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sheltonvineyards.com\">Shelton Vineyards<\/a>. \u00a0The evening was sponsored by the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ncwinegrowers.com\">North Carolina Winegrowers Association<\/a> and the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.northcarolinamuscadinegrapeassociation.org\">North Carolina Muscadine Grape Association<\/a>. \u00a0It included great food, great wine, and great company. \u00a0We loaded up the bus and headed back to the hotel to get ready for day two.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h1>Sunday Competition<\/h1>\n<p>Sunday kicked off much like Saturday with a palate cleansing wine. \u00a0The morning was devoted to commercial muscadine wines and commercial fruit\/honey wines. \u00a0This included 3-5 flights. \u00a0Around noon, we prepared for the &#8220;Best&#8221; awards. \u00a0The four panels collapsed to three panels. \u00a0Commercial wines came first. \u00a0We had been seated on different panels and remained so for the &#8220;Best&#8221; awards. \u00a0Thus we were able to judge the Fruit\/Honey award and Bunch award. \u00a0Each judge ranked his\/her top five wines in order. \u00a0The top three wines required a unanimous decision from the panel. \u00a0Once we completed the commercial &#8220;Best&#8221; awards, we moved on to the amateurs. \u00a0A similar process was used.<\/p>\n<h1>Results<\/h1>\n<p>After verification of production to confirm winning wines used at least 75% of North Carolina fruit\/honey, the &#8220;Best&#8221; awards and full results from the competition will be announced at <a href=\"http:\/\/ncwine.org\">ncwine.org<\/a> on September 1, 2017. \u00a0We will share the results once they are publicly available.<\/p>\n<p>We were truly honored to have participated in this key event of the wine industry in our state. \u00a0We saw old friends and met new ones. \u00a0We tasted a lot of wine which broadens our palates and will better prepare us as we continue our wine journey.<\/p>\n<p>Cheers!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We spent the weekend of August 18th-20th at the Shelton-Badgett Center for Viticulture and Enology at\u00a0Surry Community College in Dobson, NC for the North Carolina State Fair Wine Competition. \u00a0This was our first time ever judging a wine competition. \u00a0We were honored to have been chosen to be part of the panel of judges whichContinue reading &rarr;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":2040,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[379],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-cellar","has-thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2035"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2035\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2206,"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2035\/revisions\/2206"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ncwineguys.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}