Elin McCoy reports from three days of vertical tastings with Eduardo Chadwick in Chile, discerning the identities and following the progress of Errázuriz Don Maximiano Founder’s Reserve, Seña, and Viñedo Chadwick.
It all began on January 23, 2004, at The Ritz-Carlton in Berlin. Picture a grand room hung with crystal chandeliers, above three dozen international wine professionals seated at long tables for an unusual blind tasting. The lineup included first-growth Bordeaux, a Super-Tuscan, and several Chilean reds from the ambitious, charismatic producer who staged the event: Eduardo Chadwick.
The result was a surprise, a shock, even to Chadwick; two of his icon reds, Viñedo Chadwick 2000 and Seña 2001, emerged as number one and two respectively, beating out the great Château Lafite 2000 and Château Margaux 2001.
Chadwick’s gamble for recognition had paid off, and the taste-off came to be known as the Berlin Tasting, a milestone that upgraded the image of Chilean wines and sprinkled stardust on his own reds. Clearly relishing the memory, he once described that first tasting to me as a “David versus Goliath moment.”
So, when this dynamic, courteous wine visionary invited me to Chile to join a small group of journalists and importers for a celebration of the event’s 20th anniversary in January 2024 and promised vertical tastings of all his icon wines, of course I said yes. Who doesn’t want to take part in a victory lap?
The original Berlin Tasting, Chadwick explained, was inspired by the famous 1976 Judgment of
This Article was originally published on World of Fine Wine
