Jim Gordon of Wines & Vines was stunned — along with nearly everyone else, including yours truly — when word leaked that the Charles Shaw “Two-Buck Chuck” Chardonnay (sold exclusively at Trader Joe’s) had been voted best Chardonnay in California during the wine competition at the California State Fair in June.
Gordon was curious enough to conduct a blind tasting of several California Chardonnays, and Two-Buck Chuck finished last on his card. Writing on the Wine Enthusiast’s new blog, Unreserved, Jim speculates:
1. The system of judging failed. Maybe the judges had tried too many wines that day, or disagreed heavily over more controversial wines that were either very oaky, unoaked, too heavy with malolactic or something, so the only wine they could agree that they all liked was the most innocuous one. I think this happens frequently in big competitions with multiple judges.
2. The judges themselves were not up to the task. Maybe not enough of them had experience with great Chardonnay, or maybe it happened to be a group prejudiced against high-alcohol or even against Chardonnay in general.
3. The samples sent to the competition were not the same wine that I tried in the blind tasting. This is probably true in a very straightforward sense, because with millions of cases of Two-Buck Chuck being sold, it can’t all have been blended from exactly the same base wines in the same proportions in the same tank.
It’s my sense that Jim’s analysis is spot-on. I have no beef with Two-Buck Chuck. It fills a niche and it does so nicely at an attractive price that allows wine enthusiasts to stock up without busting the family food budget.
But best Chardonnay in California? I don’t think so. As they say, read the whole thing.
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