Texas wine won big at a prestigious competition in California. Texas wineries won more awards than ever before at the well-respected San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition last week.
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Texas wines took home 158 medals in total. According to the Dallas Morning News, those wins included seven double-gold awards, 14 single golds and several silver and bronze medals.
"This year, Texas wineries using Texas grapes won more medals — including some of the top awards — than ever before," Bob Fraser, the competition's executive director, said.
The most impressive accomplishment was that Texas wine won seven Best of Class awards this year. Best of Class awards are prestigious medals given to wines that are voted the top of their class. Price is also a variable.
Here are the Best of Class Texas winners:
- Viognier: Brennan Vineyards 2015 Reserve Viognier, Comanche County, Newburg Vineyard
- White blends: Wedding Oak Winery 2015 Sweet Alyssum, Texas High Plains, Wildseed Farms Vineyard
- Dry Rosé/Blush: Los Pinos Ranch Vineyards non-vintage Texas Sweet Blush
- Dolcetto: Perissos Vineyards and Winery 2015 Dolcetto, Texas High Plains, Diamante Doble Vineyards
- Merlot: Messina Hof Winery & Resort, 2015 Merlot, Texas
- Tempranillo: Haak Vineyards & Winery 2015 Tempranillo, Texas High Plains, Reddy Vineyards
- Malbec: Trilogy Cellars 2015 Malbec, Texas High Plains, Amanecer Vineyards, Bolen Vineyards, Krick Hill Vineyards
The competition is tough. This year there were 7,000 wine entries from more than 25 states. California controls most of the medals but anyone can enter. Then, the entries are blind tested by wine sommeliers from all over.
The six biggest categories are their sweepstakes awards. They're divided by color/type and one wine wins for having the best label. Texas hasn't gone sweepstakes nods yet, but there's always next year.
See the full list of 2017 SFCWC's medal winners on their official website.
