Avenue Vine

While full results from this year's competition aren't available yet, wine industry sources confirm the 2005 Charles Shaw vintage was the highest-scoring chardonnay in a blind tasting by judges who reviewed wines without regard to price.

I know what you’re thinking because I’m thinking the same thing. How can this be? What’s next? Forrest Gump for president? Aliens plan to spring Paris Hilton from the joint? The moon really is a big wedge of green cheese?

Although Two-Buck Chuck varietals are derided by wine devotees as barely acceptable for use in cooking, they have gained widespread acclaim from consumers who want basic table wine like those found in Italy or France.

"Everybody disses it but they drink it," Terri Cook of Guerneville said just before buying about a half-dozen bottles of chardonnay for a weekend get-together. "It's a very drinkable chardonnay."

Cook and a friend, Randall Jahn of Santa Rosa, said they have held brown-bag tastings at dinner parties and Charles Shaw chardonnay does well against wines priced at $50-$100 a bottle.

"It's a mental thing," Jahn said.

Jacek Zurawski of Rohnert Park agreed.

He buys the Charles Shaw chardonnay at the express wish of his wife.

"Taste is actually more important for normal users than price," he said. "Price is associated with name recognition, that is all."

Charles Shaw wines are produced by the Bronco Wine Co., based in Ceres near Modesto, and are almost exclusively found at Trader Joe's. Like most of the Charles Shaw varietals, the double-gold-medal-rated 2005 chardonnay sells for $1.99.

Wine industry leaders said news of this high rating on a low-priced wine is certain to prompt a consumer rush to Trader Joe's to snap up cases before official announcement of results July 12. Bronco Wine produced about 100,000 cases of the 2005 chardonnay.

"This kind of news will spur a wine that is already a great success story," said Jon Fred-rikson, a Bay Area-based wine industry consultant. "The fact that they can create that kind of quality at this price point is certainly an astonishing feat."

Since the state fair uses wine professionals as judges and the wines are tasted blind, the results stand on their own. Some 270 2005 Chardonnays were evaluated, so Two-Buck had plenty of competition.

Still, I’m wondering if this bottling of Two-Buck is really that good. Or whether, more likely, that this is a result of a clean, fruity, non-oaked Chardonnay that has enough appeal to win the approval of a panel of judges?

Judging of 3,029 California wines from 640 wineries was conducted two weekends ago in Sacramento by a gathering of 64 judges, said G.M. "Pooch" Pucilowski, chief judge and director of the competition.

Wineries that received awards are being notified this week, he said.

The wine used for judging was selected by the Bronco Wine Co. and submitted to the competition. Fred Franzia, Bronco's president, said the State Fair award will give the company's Charles Shaw brand a boost in efforts to gain wider distribution.

"I just wish some other retailers and restaurateurs had the courage and good sense to make these super-value wines available to more American wine consumers," Franzia said.

The California State Fair competition is dismissed by some critics as representing broad-based consumer tastes rather than the palates of true wine connoisseurs. But Pucilowski, who has organized the competition for more than two decades, said he draws judges from a number of professions, including winemakers and restaurant owners.

Charles Shaw's 2005 chardonnay bested 350 other chardonnays in the competition, Pucilowski said.

There’s no question that for many critics, too many Chardonnays are too oaky and there are questions about whether the wines are true to their appellations. Or whether, in the extreme, all Chardonnays taste alike, in which case it’s not only conceivable that Two-Buck could emerge a winner. It did.

If you’re wondering why this matters, well, here’s why. Think what you may about a $1.99 wine, but Two-Buck is impacting the market. It has sold 300 million bottles in five years and it continues to put downward pressure on wine prices, and at the end of the day, that’s great news for wine drinkers.

The only other double gold winner among chardonnays was Wente Winery of Livermore.

George Rose, a vice president at the Santa Rosa-based Kendall Jackson wine company, which produces a best-selling chardonnay, said its Grand Reserve Chardonnay won a silver medal in the competition.

"These competitions are quite subjective," said Rose, who noted Kendall Jackson won the best winery award at last week's San Francisco International Wine Competition. "Charles Shaw is a good gateway wine for people to try and move up in the market. So this recognition serves a great function for them."

Richard Peterson, a State Fair wine judge for 20 years, said the chardonnay tasting panel selected Charles Shaw because it was "a fresh, fruity, well-balanced chardonnay that people and judges will like, though maybe not the wine critics."

Think it’s not popular? Check out a Trader Joe’s this weekend and watch as people wheel out shopping carts loaded with cases.

Sources: “Two golds for 'Two-Buck Chuck',” Bleys W. Rose, The Press Democrat; “A Chardonnay Shocker from the California State Fair,” James Laube, Wine Spectator, June 28, 2007