{"id":11466,"date":"2015-03-26T07:20:01","date_gmt":"2015-03-26T07:20:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/?p=11466"},"modified":"2015-03-26T07:20:01","modified_gmt":"2015-03-26T07:20:01","slug":"in-st-james-cape-town-judging-wine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/from-the-road\/in-st-james-cape-town-judging-wine","title":{"rendered":"In St James, Cape Town, judging wine"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"st<\/p>\n

For the last few days I have been in St James, Cape Town, judging wine for the Top 100 South African Wines<\/a> competition. \u00a0It’s the fifth year of the competition, and many of our small judging team of seven have been here since the beginning. So it’s a nice family feeling. We’re led by uncle Tim Atkin, and then Richard Kershaw and I are deputy chairs. Making up my team are Greg Sherwood and Duncan Savage, while Richard has Justin Knock and Lizette Tolken.<\/p>\n

\"Duncan
Duncan Savage<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The judging process is pretty rigorous. It’s based around flights of wines divided by category. For example, on day 1 our team had 44 Cabernets in the morning, followed by 31 Chenin Blancs in the afternoon. We have two glasses of each wine: a freshly poured glass and a decanted glass. There’s a lot of discussion and retasting. Panels work like this: often one person will spot a wine that’s really good and the others miss it first time round.<\/p>\n

\"Greg
Greg Sherwood<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Judging wine blind is complicated and requires skill and concentration. It’s not an exact science, but if you have the right setting, efficient logistics, and a robust protocol, coupled with experienced tasters, you are more likely to produce useful results.<\/p>\n

\"st<\/p>\n

As for the setting? It’s a lovely time to be in the Cape, and St James is a beautiful place. Kalk bay is just a short stroll along the sea front and has nice bars and restaurants, as well as a sort of hippie feel. There’s a nice path that runs up to Muizenberg that’s good for an early morning loosening run. I’ve stayed here six times in the last five years, and it feels a bit like home from home. I have one more day here: I’m off to lunch at Longridge, and then it’s on the late flight home. A chance to watch bad movies and nurture some more precious memories of a good time in a lovely setting, with great people for company.<\/p>\n

\"wine<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the last few days I have been in St James, Cape Town, judging wine for the Top 100 South African Wines competition. \u00a0It’s the fifth year of the competition,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,49],"tags":[374],"class_list":["post-11466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-road","category-south-africa","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11466"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11472,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11466\/revisions\/11472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}