Who's counting?(1)
ROBERT Parker is the world's most influential wine writer. The American dominates the wine-drinking habits of consumers from Bordeaux to the Napa Valley and now has extended his reach to one of Australia's great bastions of influence and power: the wine show.
This year the 100-point scoring method championed by Parker was introduced to the Sydney Royal Wine Show.
With Australian wine drinkers increasingly comfortable with a wine receiving a score out of 100 points - many Australian wine writers now use the scoring method - show organisers introduced it to the results catalogue handed out at its public wine tasting.
Thus, the 2010 Yabby Lake YL2 chardonnay was awarded a gold-medal score of 18.7 points out of 20, or (using the show's conversion method) 96.7 points out of 100.
In October, the prestigious Canberra International Riesling Challenge (CIRC) will charge ahead and become the first major Australian wine show where all judges will use the 100-point method. Founder Ken Helm says the show needs to change to become more relevant to consumers and exhibitors.
But what model will the CIRC use (see panel)? There are many interpretations of Parker's 100-point system. Perhaps, more importantly, will a 100-point system be better than the traditional 20-point system? Those who employ the 100-point system say it has its faults. ''I hate the 100-point scale,'' says Melbourne-based wine writer Jeremy Oliver, author of The Australian Wine Annual.
Oliver says he was forced to embrace the scale after he found readers, especially those overseas, converting his scores given out of 20 to 100 points and often getting them wrong.
Some wines were credited with a score of 100, yet he has never awarded any wine a perfect score. ''Once I give 100, it means I'll never taste a better wine in my life,'' he says. ''So I've never done it.''
Oliver says multiplying a score out of 20 by five to achieve a score out of 100 - a common practice - is incorrect and misleading and he has devised his own conversion scale. Before settling on it, he worked through two different models.
Comparing the two different scoring systems is like comparing dogs with cats. The 100-point scale is interpretive with each wine writer (or now, wine show) adapting the scale to make it his or her own.
