Mr Garr goes to Italy! Film at 10

Wow and I, foolishly, always thought wine drinking was fun. This looks quite serious. The way the little desks were arranged in the tasting room gave me a terrible flashback to sitting in my high school gym at exam time.

[Robin Garr]

Wow and I, foolishly, always thought wine drinking was fun. This looks quite serious. The way the little desks were arranged in the tasting room gave me a terrible flashback to sitting in my high school gym at exam time.

Even by Italian standards, Bruce, Dr. Giuseppe Martelli runs a very tight ship. Your high-school exam analogy is apt. For more perspective, 105 judges (including 30 wine writers from about 28 counties - I think Canada and China each got two- and the rest a mix of mostly Italian enologists and a few from other countries in Europe), tasted a total of more than 3,500 wines.

The procedure you see there - 21 sommeliers marching in and pouring masked bottles in a synchronized, almost ritual move - was repeated every five minutes, 12 to 14 wines in a flight, two morning flights and two afternoon flights for four days, counting the finals, and if you fall behind on those complicated tasting sheets shown at the end, you're in deep <i>vino</i>.

Trust me on this: It has been fun, but it's also VERY hard work.

Wow and I, foolishly, always thought wine drinking was fun. This looks quite serious. The way the little desks were arranged in the tasting room gave me a terrible flashback to sitting in my high school gym at exam time.

Even by Italian standards, Bruce, Dr. Giuseppe Martelli runs a very tight ship. Your high-school exam analogy is apt. For more perspective, 105 judges (including 30 wine writers from about 28 counties - I think Canada and China each got two- and the rest a mix of mostly Italian enologists and a few from other countries in Europe), tasted a total of more than 3,500 wines.

The procedure you see there - 21 sommeliers marching in and pouring masked bottles in a synchronized, almost ritual move - was repeated every five minutes, 12 to 14 wines in a flight, two morning flights and two afternoon flights for four days, counting the finals, and if you fall behind on those complicated tasting sheets shown at the end, you're in deep <i>vino</i>.

Trust me on this: It has been fun, but it's also VERY hard work.

Robin,

Please excuse my total lack of intelligence trying to make sense of what you describe above, so, roughly, long did you get to appraise each wine?

[Robin Garr]

Please excuse my total lack of intelligence trying to make sense of what you describe above, so, roughly, long did you get to appraise each wine?

More likely my fault, David. My brain is just about shot from working 8 a.m. to midnight, seven days a week, since I got over here March 20. :p

To make a long story short: Basically, you have five minutes per wine. That said, the entire flight remains on your desk, so you *could* go back to one for more deliberation, but the procedure doesn't really build in much time to do that.

Please excuse my total lack of intelligence trying to make sense of what you describe above, so, roughly, long did you get to appraise each wine?

More likely my fault, David. My brain is just about shot from working 8 a.m. to midnight, seven days a week, since I got over here March 20. :p

To make a long story short: Basically, you have five minutes per wine. That said, the entire flight remains on your desk, so you *could* go back to one for more deliberation, but the procedure doesn't really build in much time to do that.

Thanks for that, Robin.

To make a long story short: Basically, you have five minutes per wine. That said, the entire flight remains on your desk, so you *could* go back to one for more deliberation, but the procedure doesn't really build in much time to do that.

Your explanation reminds me somewhat of that classic bit from I Love Lucy, where Lucy and Ethel are working in the candy factory and everything is fine until the conveyor belt starts speeding up and hilarity ensues.

[James Roscoe]

To make a long story short: Basically, you have five minutes per wine. That said, the entire flight remains on your desk, so you *could* go back to one for more deliberation, but the procedure doesn't really build in much time to do that.

Your explanation reminds me somewhat of that classic bit from I Love Lucy, where Lucy and Ethel are working in the candy factory and everything is fine until the conveyor belt starts speeding up and hilarity ensues.

If I were doing it I think it would look just like a cross between that episode and the one where Lucy is stomping grapes with her feet.

Wow, indeed. I was scanning the tables for spittoons, but think I only glimpsed two in the video, or were they ice buckets? So hopefully there were buckets on the floor beside each judge, although you wouldn't want a sommelier tripping over one. Or is swallowing the wine an essential part of the assessment?
Interesting to see the video. But I didn't get any controls to pause or fast forward as I was searching for Robin - and spittoons!

[Robin Garr]

Wow, indeed. I was scanning the tables for spittoons, but think I only glimpsed two in the video, or were they ice buckets? So hopefully there were buckets on the floor beside each judge, although you wouldn't want a sommelier tripping over one. Or is swallowing the wine an essential part of the assessment?
Interesting to see the video. But I didn't get any controls to pause or fast forward as I was searching for Robin - and spittoons!

There were indeed little black spittoons on the tables, Sue ... small, discreet ones, usually placed on the left-rear corner of each table. I'm not in any of the shots, alas ... I was the cameraman!

Thanks Randy for posting and thanks Robin for sharing!

Salute