{"id":13073,"date":"2015-10-26T15:00:21","date_gmt":"2015-10-26T15:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/?p=13073"},"modified":"2015-10-26T23:29:22","modified_gmt":"2015-10-26T23:29:22","slug":"dinner-at-grain-store-with-the-hedges-dudes-and-score-revolution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/restaurants\/dinner-at-grain-store-with-the-hedges-dudes-and-score-revolution","title":{"rendered":"Dinner at Grain Store with the Hedges dudes, and ‘Score Revolution’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

I had dinner last week with Boo Walker and Christophe Hedges, of Hedges in Washington State. I visited Hedges<\/a>, the custodians of Red Mountain, this summer and it was a great experience. Their slightly quirky approach and lovely, almost European-styled wines, were a breath of fresh air amid quite a lot of sweetly fruited, rather anonymous wines.<\/p>\n

\"Boo
Boo Walker<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Christophe
Christophe Hedges<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Although Boo was there at Hedges when I visited, this was the first time I’d met Christophe. We had a really nice evening together, starting off in the Craft Beer Co<\/a> at White Lion St, and then heading to the fabulous\u00a0Grain Store<\/a>. Our conversations were lengthy, animated and completely unrepeatable.<\/p>\n

\"Crushed
Crushed Paimpol beans, piquillo, lemon confit & courgette, squid ink aioli, silver mullet<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Baked
Baked onion, chestnuts & pickled walnuts, red leaves, spiced bread sauce, roast wild duck,
grated chilli chocolate<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Wild
Wild mushroom & Montgomery cheddar croquettes, truffle salt<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The food at Grain Store is just so lovely. It’s very creative, with a lot of vegetable use, and delicious. It’s great for sharing, although the menu seems to have got a bit more starter\/main of late, and less small-platey.<\/p>\n

\"Light
Light smoked potato mousseline, lovage oil, mussels<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Sprouting
Sprouting seeds & beans, miso aubergine, crispy citrus chicken skin, potato wafer<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Christophe is very interesting. Not a man to compromise, and not shy about voicing controversial opinions. Take for instance Score Revolution<\/a>, an initiative that he and the Hedges team have started.<\/p>\n

There exists an acknowledged relationship between the global influence of wine critics\u2019 numerical wine ratings and the lessening of terroir\u2019s effect on a finished wine\u2019s aromas and flavors; the \u201csense of place\u201d which differentiates one wine from another is eliminated, or dramatically reduced. Winemakers whose families have been making wine since the Gauls have been forced to chase scores and put aside their desire to make origin\u2013specific wines.<\/p>\n

While Hedges Family Estate considers wine critics the lifeblood of the wine industry, we urge them to let their words speak for themselves. We urge them not to undermine their own eloquence with the base and elementary 100\u2013point system. How can you apply a number to any art form? Quantifying a subjective experience is simply not logical. Let us allow winemakers to practice their art with the freedom to let their land speak, allow consumers to make their own decisions and exercise their palates, and allow wine critics to practice their craft and let their words speak for themselves.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hedges no longer submit their wines for scoring by critics, which is brave, and I kind of agree with many of their points. But I still score wines, because despite the limitations of the scoring system, it lets readers know just how much I liked the wine. I could use stars, or ticks – but I use the daft 100 point scale because that is what the powerful critics have always used, and so the sorts of people who buy more expensive wines can relate to these scores. Maybe I should stop scoring?<\/p>\n

We tasted one Hedges wine. It was lovely. And I gave it a score! Will Christophe and Boo still be friendly towards me?<\/p>\n

Hedges Family Estate La Haute Cuv\u00e9<\/b>e 2013 Red Mountain, Washington State
\n<\/b>The previous vintage of this was the first biodynamic Washington State Cabernet, and the first biodynamic wine from Red Mountain. This is complex, spicy, dense and rich with lovely fine-grained tannins. Nice density of pure blackcurrant and black cherry fruit. Dense and with some structure, but also with a lovely silkiness. 94\/100<\/p>\n

Find this wine with wine-searcher.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had dinner last week with Boo Walker and Christophe Hedges, of Hedges in Washington State. I visited Hedges, the custodians of Red Mountain, this summer and it was a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[74,287],"tags":[383,422],"class_list":["post-13073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-restaurants","category-washington-state","tag-restaurants","tag-washington-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13073","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=13073"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13073\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13089,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13073\/revisions\/13089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}