Octagon Breaks Through

Reporting in The Washington Post, critic Dave McIntyre writes that a wine tasting which he convened with 6 leading experts proved to everyone’s satisfaction, that Virginia wines do compete with France and Napa Valley in quality, price, and diversity of varietal excellence. Leading the reds was Octagon 2006, the latest vintage of the wine which has been compared to Patton’s Third Army, in its capacity to break through a habitual, entrenched skepticism surrounding Virginia wines. Comparing the results of this blind tasting with the famed Judgment of Paris of 1976, in which California red wines overcame critical prejudice in comparison with those of Bordeaux, McIntyre reports that the same shock was repeated at this event. Fair enough, but now there was this difference: what California had done against one dominant region, Virginia had achieved against two, and after 30 years of improvements in both of them. Octagon was widely suspected, in fact, of coming from Bordeaux -- much as Eliza was authoritatively “exposed" as a Hungarian princess, in “My Fair Lady.”

We compliment two colleagues in Virginia viticulture for success in Chardonnay and Cabernet Franc at this same event. Ultimately, McIntyre says, “local wines can match the best in the world.” For residents of this region, itself, we offer the judgment a cautious customer proclaimed, when Philéo won its Gold Medal in San Francisco -- “It’s OK to like it!” The whole world says it is.