Parker adopts 1000-point scale
In a move that has left the wine world reeling, renowned hedonist, critic and cyclist Robert M. Parker Jr. announced Sunday morning that he would be dispensing with his polarising 100-point scale and replacing it with a more comprehensive grading system.
"Wine is too nuanced, too complex, too vast a subject to trap within the confines of a mere hundred points" Parker explained while tucking into an enormous lobe of foie gras decorated with Maryland crab claws. As he washed it down with a La Mission Haut Brion '89, swilled from a Sommelier series Riedel tankard, he stared at the liquid for a moment and reflected. "For instance, this used to be a hundred point wine. Which is nice and everything, but now it's a thousand point wine - how f***ing cool is that?"
Wine merchants throughout the world have been left on tenterhooks, wondering what the new scores would be and how it would affect prices. One anonymous source based in Hong Kong suggested that an extra zero could be added to the price tag as well as the score. He salivated, rubbed his fingers together and gazed emptily into space as he made the remark.
The cynics and whiners in the trade, those who eschew the hundred point scale and find 19% table wines with obscene sugar levels and no acidity ungodly, were unsurprisingly non-plussed by the announcement. "I don't even know where to start. This is ridiculous," said one Phd-touting wine blogger. Another just laughed and cracked open a beer.
Producer reactions were a mixed bag. Randall Grahm of Bonny Doon gazed for a few moments at a perfectly cut piece of quartz and then returned to his crossword, muttering something about sleep. Michel Rolland bought an oak forest and winked at this journalist conspiratorially.
Bizarrely enough, some Twitter folks were most vocal in their outrage, claiming that Parker, by increasing his scale, had in fact stolen a precious character from their limited budget.
One journalist was mauled by a rottweiler, having mistakenly pestered Robert B. Parker, creator of the Spencer For Hire books, for a quote.
In the midst of all the furore, The Wine Advocate offices revealed that whilst the scale would be 1000 points, simply being a wine would immediately qualify for 950 points.
So there you go.
Happy April.
"Wine is too nuanced, too complex, too vast a subject to trap within the confines of a mere hundred points" Parker explained while tucking into an enormous lobe of foie gras decorated with Maryland crab claws. As he washed it down with a La Mission Haut Brion '89, swilled from a Sommelier series Riedel tankard, he stared at the liquid for a moment and reflected. "For instance, this used to be a hundred point wine. Which is nice and everything, but now it's a thousand point wine - how f***ing cool is that?"
Wine merchants throughout the world have been left on tenterhooks, wondering what the new scores would be and how it would affect prices. One anonymous source based in Hong Kong suggested that an extra zero could be added to the price tag as well as the score. He salivated, rubbed his fingers together and gazed emptily into space as he made the remark.
The cynics and whiners in the trade, those who eschew the hundred point scale and find 19% table wines with obscene sugar levels and no acidity ungodly, were unsurprisingly non-plussed by the announcement. "I don't even know where to start. This is ridiculous," said one Phd-touting wine blogger. Another just laughed and cracked open a beer.
Producer reactions were a mixed bag. Randall Grahm of Bonny Doon gazed for a few moments at a perfectly cut piece of quartz and then returned to his crossword, muttering something about sleep. Michel Rolland bought an oak forest and winked at this journalist conspiratorially.
Bizarrely enough, some Twitter folks were most vocal in their outrage, claiming that Parker, by increasing his scale, had in fact stolen a precious character from their limited budget.
One journalist was mauled by a rottweiler, having mistakenly pestered Robert B. Parker, creator of the Spencer For Hire books, for a quote.
In the midst of all the furore, The Wine Advocate offices revealed that whilst the scale would be 1000 points, simply being a wine would immediately qualify for 950 points.
So there you go.
Happy April.