Sonoma Harvest Fair releases list of medalists

The judges for this year’s Sonoma County Harvest Fair Wine Competition have made their final recommendations, and 94 percent of the wines entered will receive some type of medal.

Judging for the competition was held from Tuesday to Thursday at the Showcase Cafe at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds and reflected the growing quality of entries, said Bob Fraser, who oversees judging for the competition.

About five years ago the competition created a new category, double gold, to reflect wines that stood out beyond the then-current grading scale, he said.

“Across the board, the judges felt remarkably that the wines were consistently better. They were clean. They seem to have a lot of flavor,” said Fraser.

Fair officials were scheduled to release their list of the winners today on the fair’s website at harvestfair.org. The fair runs from Sept. 30 to Oct. 2 at the fairgrounds.

But the big awards in the competition are yet to come - the three sweepstakes medals for the white, red and sparkling and specialty categories. Those winners will not be revealed until the fair’s awards dinner, which will be held Sept. 25 at the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts.

Out of the 1,094 wines entered by 195 brands, there were 1,025 medals awarded, said Sheila Quince, the wine judging coordinator for the fair.

There were 347 golds awarded, a group that includes double golds, single golds and the 40 best of class wines generated from the gold categories.

The best of class wines were judged again on Thursday as those entries were eligible to compete for the sweepstakes categories. Any wine with a Sonoma County American Viticultural Area label is eligible to be entered in the competition.

Judges gave 497 silver medals and 181 bronze medals. A few wineries had multiple winners for the best of class category. Estate 1856, deLorimier Winery, Imagery Estate Winery, Kenwood Vineyards, Mayo Family Winery, Stephen & Walker, and Trentadue Winery all won two best of class awards.

You can reach Staff Writer Bill Swindell at 521-5223 or bill.swindell@pressdemocrat.com. ?On Twitter @BillSwindell.