Learn to be a Wine Judge via an In-Depth Look at the BC Wine Industry

One of the ideas we have kicked around at Wine Bloggers Conference headquarters is creating a brand-new wine competition centered on the Wine Bloggers Conference with wine bloggers as judges. Wineries would send wines to be judged, interested bloggers would gather for 1/2 a day pre-conference to judge the wines, and then we would issue awards. We think the experience would be great for wine bloggers (who could take the experience and judge at other competitions) and the competition would be excellent publicity for the wine blogging community.

As a first step in this direction, we will hold a 2.5-hour session on Saturday morning at the 2013 Wine Bloggers Conference as follows:

Learn to be a Wine Judge via an In-Depth Look at the BC Wine Industry: Learn the requirements and take the initial step to add wine judging to your list of qualifications, all while hearing from an eminent panel of British Columbia Wine Industry experts. This unique 2.5-hour session will use the concept of terroir and the importance of place, all focused on British Columbia, to guide us through how wine judges actually score wines.

The cool thing about this panel is we have a fantastic lineup of British Columbia wine experts, which means not only will we be learning about wine judging but we’ll be doing so via the theme of British Columbia terroir. I want to give special recognition to Kristof Gillese, who suggested the idea of incorporating BC terroir into the panel and who put the panel together, as follows:

• Chef Kristof Gillese, Moderator, The Chef and the Grape: Chef Kristof is a blogger best known for his writing at AStudentOfWine. While waiting to finish his Certified Chef du Cuisine program, Kristof has completed the ISG levels 1 and 2, is active in the French Wine Scholar program and will be progressing to the Bordeaux Master program late in 2013.
• Eric von Krosigk, Winemaker and Viticulturist at Summerhill Pyramid Winery: Eric co-founded Summerhill but also helped establish Red Rooster, Adora Estate Winery, and Victoria Estate wineries as part of EVK Winery Consulting. He is one of the most awarded winemakers in British Columbia.
• Sandra Oldfield, Winemaker, President, & CEO at Tinhorn Creek: Sandra is a Santa Rosa transplant and graduate of UC Davis, where she studied winemaking and Canadian history before moving north to Oliver, BC.
• John Clerides, Owner at Marquis Wine Cellars: John founded and has been running his Vancouver wine store, a pantheon in the wine importing and retail sales industry, since 1986. John travels the world mulitiple times each year to source top-level wines of all price-points that express their regions with passion and finesse.
• Harry Hertscheg, Executive Director of the Vancouver International Wine Festival: Harry is one of the premier players in the BC wine industry via his role leading the Vancouver International Wine Festival, considered one of the oldest and best wine events in the world.

We know you will appreciate this session and we hope you are enthusiastic about the idea of a future WBC Wine Competition.