In what came to be called the Judgment of Paris, he arranged for California and French wines to be compared in a blind tasting. The verdict was a shocker. The world was paying little attention on May 24, 1976, when a small wine tasting was held in Paris at the Intercontinental Hotel. But the echoes of that tasting, later called the Judgment of Paris, have resounded for decades. The instigator, Steven Spurrier, an Englishman who owned a wine shop and wine school in Paris, had set up a blind tasting of 20 wines — 10 white and 10 red — for nine French judges, including some of the top names in the French wine and food establishment. Of the whites, all made from the chardonnay grape, six were from California, four from Burgundy. The reds, all made largely or entirely from cabernet sauvignon, included six from California and four from Bordeaux. It was hardly thought to be a fair fight. As has been recounted countless times, the judges were thoroughly convinced that California wines were inferior.“Ah, back to France,” one judge sighed after tasting a Napa Valley chardonnay. Another, sniffing a Bâtard-Montrachet, declared: “This is definitely California. It has no nose.”When all was done, a shocking consensus revealed the favorite wines to be a 1973 chardonnay from Chateau Montelena and a 1973 cabernet sauvignon from Stag’s Leap Cellars, both in Napa Valley. The Americans celebrated, the French shrank in consternation, and everlasting fame awaited Mr. Spurrier, who went on to a long career as a wine entrepreneur. Mr. Spurrier died on March 9 at his home in the village of Litton Cheney in Dorset, England. He was 79. The cause was cancer, said Simon McMurtrie, chairman and publisher of the Académie du Vin Library, a wine imprint founded by Mr. Spurrier. The Paris tasting might have swiftly been forgotten had not a single reporter, George M. Taber of Time magazine, been on hand to witness the events. His article, “Judgment of Paris,” gave the California wine industry a much-needed boost, lending its vintners international credibility at a time when they were searching for critical approval and public acceptance. Marketers used the tasting to sell California wines all over the world.“It rocketed us to fame,” said Bo Barrett, whose father, Jim Barrett, was the proprietor of Chateau Montelena. Warren Winiarski, the founder of Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars, said in 1983: “The phone started to ring pretty quickly. The wines really took off.”For years afterward, wine professionals — occasionally joined by Mr. Spurrier himself — and amateur enthusiasts re-enacted the tasting. Mr. Taber, the reporter, in 2005 published a book, “Judgment of Paris: California vs. France and the Historic 1976 Paris Tasting That Revolutionized Wine.” A 2008 film, “Bottle Shock,” with Alan Rickman playing Mr. Spurrier, depicted the tasting as the climax of a triumph-of-the-underdog story.
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