This proved interesting, as Max and I could generally agree unerringly on the specific character of each wine but brought antipodally different opinions to some of the more extreme examples. With a little friendly negotiating, though, we managed to agree on all our finalists in terms of quality without having to bring in a referee. A tuna carpaccio, a veal kidney pie and an amazing dish of white fish rolled around crab stand out in my mind's eye as courses that would have done credit to any restaurant. A culinary joy quickly turned into hard work, though, as we thoughfully examined each of the hundreds of finalists with its matching dish, jotting down our impressions of each and our thoughts on why it did or did not work with the food. We kept notes on both paper forms and dictated our comments into tape recorders, turning over all the reports in a growing stack that will take the competition staff weeks to sort and process.
Nobody knows the results yet, even the judges.
The judges were mostly wine journalists, with a few wine-industry folks thrown in. In order to maintain objectivity and avoid conflicts of interest, I accept no free samples from wineries or distributors, purchasing all the wines I rate at my own expense in retail stores. E-mail me your tasting notes , and I'll consider adding them to this page.