I wish others had waited to post their notes, which is why I was reluctant to give them back, but did anyway. It’s not my aim to point fingers at tasters or to prove anything beyond the fact that a truly double blind tasting is educational—or it should be.
So, here’s the analysis of the Nov 8 Riesling tasting.
There were 13 wines—six German, six New York, and one Canadian Riesling—but the tasters sampled fifteen. The purpose of the duplicate pours was to point out to tasters how perceptions can be altered by what is tasted before and after a wine.
In the case of the Wiemer, I purposely put it before another Finger Lakes and after the Donnhoff, knowing that the wine had the potential to make others think German. The Prejean was placed before and after a German and a Canadian wine, to see what the potential jumble of tastes might cause.
The Wiemer received 90 and above points from 6 tasters, however, no taster scored it that way twice.
The majority of tasters who did not like the two wines that were duplicated, had written the same general reason for their dislike of the wines on each occasion. This was not the case for those who scored the wines at or above 90.
5 out of 6 who scored Wiemer in the 90s scored the first appearance of the wine over the second, the remaining person scored in the opposite direction.
Of the 4 who scored Prejean in the 90s, 2 preferred the first appearance; 2 preferred the second.
Four New York wines received ratings at or above 90 points; of the four, Wiemer received 6, Prejean received 4, Glenora received 1, and Atwater (the one that had to be replaced by a second bottle) received 1. A total of 12 NY scores at or above 90.
Five German wines received ratings at or above 90; of the five, Donnhoff received 5, Messmer received 4, Selbach-Oster received 3, Bassermann received 2, and Lietz received 1. A total of 15 German scores at or above 90.
Vineland Estate received two scores at or above 90. A total of 2 Canadian scores at or above 90.
The best I can determine, 131 scores were in the 80s, with 30 scores in the 70s, and 27 scores under 70. Some people skipped a few scores, and others refused to follow the scoring chart I made up just for this event.
Here are stats I find truly interesting:
2 tasters gave 90 or above only to German wine.
4 tasters gave 90 or above only to NY wine.
4 tasters gave 90 or above to both German and NY wine.
1 taster gave 90 or above to German and Canadian wine.
1 taster gave 90 or above to NY and Canadian wine.
It was truly difficult to decipher most handwriting, but overall verbal impressions for the range of wines were relatively good across the board, with of course a few hate this and hate that. Generally, those who preferred German over NY wines seemed to have plenty of trouble with the phenolics of the latter.
The list of wines in the order that they were tasted.
2006 Bassermann-Jordan Riesling Trocken ($15.99 - Pfalz)
2007 Chateau Lafayette Reneau Dry Rielsing ($14.99 Seneca Lake, East Side)
2006 Schlossgut Diel Goldloch Riesling Trocken Grosses Gewachs ($59.99 - Nahe)
2007 Josef Leitz Ein Zwei Dry '3' Riesling Trocken ($15.99 - Rheingau)
2007 Ravines Dry Argenstsiner Vineyard Riesling ($25.00 Keuka Lake, East Side)
2006 Hermann Wiemer Dry Riesling ($17.99 Seneca Lake, West Side)
2007 Glenora Dry Riesling ($11.99 Seneca Lake, West Side)
2006 Hermann Donnhoff Grey Slate Riesling Trocken ($19.99 - Nahe)
2006 Hermann Wiemer Dry Riesling ($17.99 Seneca Lake, West Side)
2006 Selbach-Oster Zeltinger Himmelreich Riesling Kabinett Halbtrocken ($19.99 - Mosel)
2006 Atwater Estate Semi-Dry Riesling ($17.00 Seneca Lake, East Side)
2006 Prejean Semi-Dry Riesling ($11.99 Seneca Lake, West Side)
2007 Messmer Riesling Halbtrocken ($13.99 - Pfalz)
2007 Vineland Estate Semi-dry Riesling ($ ? Ontario)
2006 Prejean Semi-dry Riesling ($11.99 Seneca Lake, West Side)