Sierra Carche - Jay Miller - and the latest black eye

WINE TALK
21

No. Parker rated that one something like 93, and most people thought it scored in the high 80’s. Someone sent Parker a bottle of their ‘bad’ wine, and Parker (and his wife for back-up) both said it was about 91 points. close enough that it wasn’t enough to bitch about IMHO.

But, Even at its very best, there wasn’t an ounce of pleasure in the Sierra Carche. 20 points is a huge difference as opposed to just something like 2.

22

I’m sure there are lots of doctored/“specially chosen” samples for critics. But with the diversity of scores on CT (see link in Douglass’s post)* another possibility occurs to me. What if the original sample was the legitimate wine, but when it got a 96 the producer decided “hey, we’ve got X cases that are certainly going to sell out, we could easily sell 3X, go buy some wine and slap label on.” That would explain the fact there are a lot of “undrinkable” as well as a lot of wines that are praised.

This is all academic to me of course as I’m about as likely to buy a modern Spanish wine with high JM score as I am Chinese snake wine. :slight_smile:

23

I tried it and thought it was awful. In fact, it prompted the first (and still only) email I’ve sent to a wine retailer.
On 9/8/08 I sent an email to Gary V at WL telling him Sierra Carche “was the most disappointing wine I’ve had in recent memory”.

24

Which is why Miller announced that this was fraud, a very serious allegation.

He would almost be better off saying he overrated the wine orginally. The importer and winery, if they can prove no fraud took place, may have an interesting lawsuit brewing.

I expect his post to be edited shortly, much like Parker edited his ripping of the WSJ.

25

That’s the funniest thing I have ever heard. [rofl.gif]

26

Seriously! I mean at this point can Miller be taken seriously at all. some crap story as to why he got the vintage wrong on the new undrinkable wine. I know there are shinanigan in the wine trade, I will grant him he may have been decived and this is bad. Then again, is this not the man that said the only good wines come from the big importers and goes on to list his buds Solomon being one of them? If the winery is set on deception not much he can do but would this not be better if his tasting procedures were altered to make it next to impossible for this to be the case. My hand are up I quit with this bunch of excusse makers and appologists. The information has ceassed to have value for me or my customers!

27

Don’t get carried away

28

"More seriously, this is about the worst thing that can happen to a critic, to be tasted on a fraudulent wine…"

Staggering plus for me!

29

It is his responsibility, as a critic, to sample and review a finished product that can be trusted. That’s where the problem is. Too many times INFLUENTIAL critics are provided with questionable samples and not what ends up being bottled. Let’s not forget one major thing here: the difference between even 89 and 92 points can spell economic failure for producers, importers and distributors so there are forces at play that can push dishonesty to the forefront, very easily.

Review the finished, in bottle, product that’s on the shelves damn it! At least take one major variable out of the equation. I would not trust any HUGELY interested party spoon-feeding a sample for review.

30

Greg, I meant “Isn’t him calling out a winery for giving him fraudulent samples a big deal?”. I don’t think I have ever seen that come out of any critics mouth before.

31

Well, there was the Parker/Faiveley affair.

32

Ding ding ding [winner.gif] [winner.gif] [winner.gif]

33

Exactly.

34

That avatar cracks me up every time. Did you wash it before giving it back to A.? neener

35

Dan,
I have only skimmed the summary of what happened. For all I know it might be Killer minus. I only posted TIC because of the terminology you used.

36

Ooo do tell, never heard that one and I suspect a search on ebob will come up empty.

37

…which by the way should be proprietary and you should be suing his ass as we speak for infringement. [dance2.gif]

38

Faiveley Drops Libel Suit Against Robert Parker

Burgundy vintner François Faiveley has dropped a libel lawsuit against Robert Parker after reaching an out-of- court settlement with the American wine critic and his book publisher.

In February, Faiveley sued Parker and the critic’s publisher, Simon & Schuster, over a passage in Parker’s Wine Buyer’s Guide that Faiveley believed libeled his winery. According to the agreement, the defendants will eliminate the controversial paragraph from future editions of the book. Faiveley also said that the settlement calls for the publisher to stop distributing the current edition of the book after May 30, the date the settlement was signed. Parker also published a notice in his newsletter, The Wine Advocate.

“Robert Parker has agreed to what I had asked,” said Faiveley, an influential négociant in Burgundy. He said he never asked for any damages beyond a symbolic 1 franc from each of the defendants.

–Per-Henrik Mansson

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39

We still do not know what proportion of the wines are flawed to correct (if we assume that the bottle Jay drank was correct and non-doctored). Let’s say it is 20%? How is Jay/TWA supposed to detect this? Taste through the wine an additional 5-10 times from varying sources? Impossible.

What will strike me as funny is if the flawed rate is, let’s say, 50% of what’s on the market, this will also be a black eye to cellartracker, as I’ve always had a sneaking suspicion that many taster’s notes/scores are influenced by professionals/their peers. I believe this wine is averaging in the 90s on CT with a large enough sampling size…

40

steve, here is my note on this wine from feb. when I had it in a blind tasting. The theme of the tasting was wines with 95+ scores that were in the $60-75 range and under:

  • 2005 Bodegas y Viñedos de Murcia Jumilla Sierra Carche - Spain, Murcia, Jumilla (2/28/2009)
    “Classic Values” night (Phillip’s apt, Chicago IL): this bottle was a real mess. Highly disjointed on both the palate and nose with some weird black fruits, bad black licorice and a whole lot of burnt plastic tones. There is nothing but tannins and out of whack acidity on the palate. Something just doesn’t seem right about this wine and revisiting it later in the evening only made it worse. I’m with holding judgment until possibly trying a bottle in the future NR (flawed)

Posted from CellarTracker




Back then I wrote flawed figuring that this had to be aberration as there were some positive reviews of this wine on CT and mine was the only one that was this bad. My friend bought them from WL and still has two more. I sent him a link to the ebob thread and Iain’s post here and hope that when he opens his other bottle that its a good bottle. My guess however after seeing other people chime in is that it will probably be more like the first one