There is, of course, no “world’s best sauvignon blanc wine”. What is best depends on your personal preferences (yes, wine scoring is subjective). But picking the winners out of a selection of 1200 sauvignons from all over the world will give you a list of some excellent wines to drink. This articles gives you the medal winners in the “Concours Mondial du Sauvignon” also known as the Sauvignon Selection, or, unofficially, as The World Sauvignon Blanc Competition with 1200 wines. Plus some of my personal favourites among the sauvignon wines that I tasted, since I was part of the jury. I also highlight some of the more unusual countries for sauvignon, that I think deserve extra kudos for their good work.
It is true that the world’s most famous wines don’t take part in wine competitions. Why would they? They are already famous. And they run the risk of not winning medals when tasted blind (how embarrassing). And if these are the wines you are looking for, you can easily find them by looking at the price tag.
It seems to me to be more interesting to look at a large selection of wines in price ranges that are acceptable to “normal” wine drinkers, say between five and fifty euro, and find the ones that are particularly good and worth seeking out. That is the kind of wines that you find in the Concours Mondial du Sauvignon. (There is no actual price range for the wines in the competition, but I would estimate that most of the are in that span.)
This is a longer version of an article published on Forbes.com.
A few days ago I wrote about my selection of favourite wines from the Selection Sauvignon competition and I promised to come back with details of the overall medal winners. So, here you can read about some of the very best wines out of the 1210 that participated in the competition.
What is the Concours Mondial du Sauvignon?
But first a few words about how the competition works. Essentially, the Concours Mondial du Sauvignon / Sauvignon Blanc Selection (or World Sauvignon Blanc competition) is a totally “blind” tasting; you know nothing about the wines you taste, except that it is sauvignon. You taste the wines in series of around a dozen wines and they are in some way “similar”, for example, a series can be (but doesn’t have to be) from a specific region. But in that case, you as a taster do not know which region. The only thing that you know is the vintage, but personally I find that to be mainly irrelevant. The vintage should not really influence your judgement of a wine. Sometimes you can get some additional information if it can have a specific impact on the evaluation of the wine, e.g. “this is oak-aged” or “this is a blend” (with dominant sauvignon).
So you basically taste all the wines completely blind and evaluate them simply based on the impression you get when you taste them – their intrinsic quality in your own opinion.
The competition was hosted by South Africa, in Franschhoek. South Africa is a great source for exciting sauvignon blanc which also showed in the results.
Wine competition “theory”
Some other competitions are “half blind”. They may group the wines into what they consider to be logical categories, for example “Loire Valley sauvignon blanc in a price range between 5 and 15 euro”. That tends to lead to that the tasters judge the wines more on “typicity”, i.e. if they are typical for the category they are in, rather than based on the wines’ intrinsic quality. Personally, I prefer to judge the wine on their taste rather than on how they fit some imaginary idealised taste profile. As a taster, you don’t know what objective the winemaker had, nor do you know what the consumer expects from a certain wine he purchases. Instead, judging wines simply based on their characteristics can sometimes give good surprises when you are tasting and judging the wines without preconceived ideas.
Other tastings, for example the Nordic Wine Challenge, put wines in price bands, very narrow groups too, say €7-7.99, €8-8.99 etc. This, in my opinion, has several weaknesses. Each category then has very few wines but still awards a number of medals. But more importantly, this largely defeats the point of the competition. The results in such a competition will show “the best out of 15 in a price range that differ not more than one euro”. Surely it is more interesting to find that wines that are substantially over-performing compared to their price? In the Sauvignon Selection, a wine that costs only, say eight euro, can “win” over one that costs 30 euro, because the compete side to side. That will never happen if you use price bands.
Wine is basically subjective but that does not negate joint scoring
All wine tasting is essentially subjective. There is no way to judge wines “neutrally” or “objectively” on some universal quality scale. What is the objectively “perfect” amount of acidity or “perfect” amount of oak ageing? Well, it depends on your preferences. This being said, in most cases the 5-7 judges in each tasting panel tends to have similar opinions. But there are sometimes disagreements.
Sauvignon Blanc characteristics
Sauvignon blanc is a wine that will delight you with its variety and complexity. It is far from as one-dimensional as some think. It often has a lovely aroma that hints at fresh grass, green leaves and elderflower, as well as exotic fruits like passionfruit and carambola fruit. It tastes crisp and refreshing, with high acidity and a burst of fresh fruity flavors. Some sauvignon blancs are aged in oak barrels, giving them more depth and richness.
Sauvignon blanc owes its distinctive character to two groups of aromatic compounds: the thiols and the methoxypyrazines. The thiols are responsible for the citrusy and tropical fruit aromas that make your mouth water. The methoxypyrazines give sauvignon blanc its vegetal, “green” or herbaceous character that reminds you of verdant nature. And yes, sometimes they can also give it a hint of cat pee, but don’t let that scare you away from this amazing wine! I never find that myself, perhaps because I am happily without cat.
You can read a more detailed profile of the sauvignon blanc grape here (our grape variety profile).
The winning wines
But let’s dive into the wines that stood out in the Concours Mondial du Sauvignon, or the CMB Sauvignon Selection.
Eight wines were awarded special trophies, so called “revelations”:
Best Sauvignon of the Competition – Dubourdieu Trophy
- Sauvignon Blanc Sieme Eichberg 2021 Weingut Adam-Lieleg, Südsteiermark, Austria
Revelation Austria
- Sauvignon Blanc Neusetzberg 2020 Weingut Krispel, Vulkanland Steiermark, Austria
Revelation Blend
- Sauvignon Chardonnay 2022 Domaine Saint-Lannes (SARL Nicolas Duffour), Côtes de Gascogne IGP, France
Revelation France
- La Grande Chatelaine 2019 Vignobles Joseph Mellot, Sancerre, France
Revelation Italy
- Raif Sauvignon 2021, Azienda Vinicola d. Giovanett G. C. sas, Vigneti delle Dolomiti IGT (Trentino Alto Adige), Italy
Revelation New-Zealand
- Saint Clair Pioneer Block 1 Foundation Block Sauvignon Blanc 2022, Saint Clair Family Estate, Marlborough
Revelation South Africa
- Gustus Sauvignon Blanc 2020, Darling Cellars, Darling, South Africa
Revelation Oaked Sauvignon – Tonnellerie Sylvain Trophy
- Villiera Bush Vine Sauvignon Blanc 2022, Villiera Wines, Stellenbosch, South Africa
All in all a bit less than a third of the wines were awarded some kind of medal. You can find all the medals at the Concours Mondial du Sauvignon here.
The country that brought home the largest number of medals was France which is not surprising since it is also the country with the most sauvignon blanc vineyards. The Steiermark region in Austria was the single wine region that won the most medals, with 85 medals. Encouraging, since the competition will be held in Austria next year. South Africa, that hosted the competition this year, was awarded an impressive 56 medals, a clear illustration of that this is a successful grape variety in the country. That is not surprising. It is a grape variety that gets a lot of attention in South Africa and they even have an organisation to promote it: Sauvignon Blanc South Africa.
My top 12 sauvignon wines
As mentioned in my previous article on my personal favourites in the sauvignon blanc competition, I tasted 122 wines. The full list of favourites is in that article but here are my personal top wines (remember, I “only” tasted 122 wines out of the 1210):
Per’s top 12 sauvignon blancs (in no specific order):
- Ara Single Estate Sauvignon Blanc 2022, Marlborough, New Zealand. Classic grass and green leaf aromas. Clean grassy mouth, with grapefruit and carambola, classic again. Medium body. Nice expression.
- Starborough 2021, Marlborough, New Zealand. Slightly more ripe colour (hay). Very expressive nose, very much sauvignon, green crunchy apples, a touch of sweet fruit. Good body, lots of green fruit, fresh, plenty of sauvignon character. Very good balance and expression.
- Giesen The August Sauvignon Bland 2019, Marlborough, New Zealand. Nice round nose with ripe fruit, some honey and ripe peaches. Full-bodied, very fresh and balanced palate, some honeyed notes, dry and crisp, hint of wax. Will be lovely on the dinner table.
- Domaine des Echardières 2022, Touraine, Loire Valley, France. Light elegant nose with green apples. Classic sauvignon aromatics with some herbs and grassiness. Lots of aromatic intensity on the palate, very sauvignon blanc-style. Long finish.
- Domaine Joël Delaunay 2022, Touraine, Loire Valley, France. Light elegant aromatic nose with white flowers. Elderflower. Good balance in the mouth, lots of fresh green fruit. Quite intense. Long finish.
- Contreberg Sauvignon Blanc 2021, Darling, South Africa. Relatively ripe nose with some fresh melons. Nice freshness. Very good balance. Long.
- Gustus Sauvignon Blanc 2021, Darling, South Africa. Grapefruit, gooseberry, very classic sauvignon. Good body, classic. Quite long.
- Gustus Sauvignon Blanc 2020, Darling, South Africa. Comparatively deep colour, golden. Quite ripe and some sweetish fruit (but no sweetness in the wine!), ripe peaches. Nice body, very good balance, touch of (nice) bitterness, fresh yellow fruit. Eminently drinkable wine. Lingering.
- Sauvignon Blanc di Rosa Bosco 2021, Colli Orientali del Friuli, Italy. Ripe melons, waxy, touch of honey. Full-bodied, very high and fresh acidity, dry and mineral. Lots of character. ‘Dry honey’, unusual sauvignon. Long finish, with some (good) bitterness.
- Aquilis 2019, Friuli Aquileia, Italy. Possibly some reduction but nothing that is disturbing. Quite the opposite. Some honey and wax (maybe the reduction disappeared?). Quite good body with very citrusy acidity, a touch of waxiness. Quite long.
- Boschendal 1685 Sauvignon Blanc 2022, Cape South Coast, South Africa. Nice expressive nose with some herbs and grass. Quite a bit of ripe yellow fruit too. Relatively intense and full-bodied, good sauvignon character. Long intense finish.
- Saint Clair Sauvignon Blanc Bubbles 2022, Marlborough, New Zealand. Nice sauvignon nose. Palate with gooseberry, green herbs, very good expression of sauvignon.
South Africa, host to the competition, did very well with four wines on my list!
Kudos to these sauvignon blancs from unexpected countries
The whole list of medal winners is long so I won’t subject you to that. But in addition to the above, I would like to give some special recognition to some of the wines that showed well but that were from less famous places when it comes to Sauvignon blanc:
One medal winner from Argentina:
- Sauvignon Blanc Extremo 2021 Bodega Altupalka, Salta
Three from Bulgaria:
- DiVes winery Sauvignon Blanc Aged in oak barrels 2020, PGI Thracian Valley
- Quantum Sauvignon Blanc 2022, Domaine Boyar
- Pearl White Sauvignon Blanc Semillon 2022, Domaine Boyar
One from Chile:
- Casillero del Diablo Reserva Especial Sauvignon Blanc 2022, Valle de Colchagua
Three from Croatia:
- Sauvignon 2022 Vinarija Kopjar, Zagorje-Međimurje
- Sauvignon 2022 Vinarija Puhelek Purek, Prigorje-Bilogora ZOI
- Sauvignon 2022 Bolfan Vinski, Zagorje-Međimurje ZOI
One from the United States:
- Estate Sauvignon Blanc 2022 St. Supéry Estate Vineyards Winery, Napa Valley
Three from Greece
- Droumo Sauvignon Blanc 2021 Kir Yianni S.a, Macedonia, Regional Wine of Florina
- Samaropetra 2022 Kir Yianni S.a, Macedonia, Regional Wine of Florina
- Sauvignon Blanc 2022 Ktima Gerovassiliou, Macedonia
Two from Hungary:
- Bujdoso Sauvignon Blanc Selection 2021 Bujdosó Szolobirtok és Pincészet, Lake Balaton
- Haraszthy Clone Sauvignon 2021 Haraszthy Pincészet Ltd , , The Great Plain, Etyek-Buda
One from Northern Macedonia
- Sauvignon Blanc Barovo 2022 Tikves AD Kavadarci Winery
Two from Mexico
- Vinaltura Sauvignon Blanc 2020 Vinaltura SA de Cv, Querétaro
- GG By Gina Sommelier Sauvignon Blanc 2018 Hoteles y Viñedos del Valle de Guadalupe SA de CV, Baja California
One from Portugal:
- Lagoalva Sauvignon Blanc-Verdelho 2022, Quinta da Lagoalva Vinhos SA, Tejo
Three from Romania:
- Castel Sauvignon Blanc 2017 Jidvei Srl, Transylvanie, Târnave
- Sauvignon Blanc Coltul Pietrei 2021 Vitis Metamorfosis, Muntenia, Dealu Mare
- Domeniul Ciumbrud Sauvignon Blanc 2022 Sc Domeniile Boieru Srl, Transylvanie, Aiud
One from Slovenia:
- EK Vinarstvo Šmarje Unoaked 2021 EK Vinarstvo Šmarje d.o.o., Primorska
And finally, two from Switzerland:
- Sauvignon Blanc La Mine 2022 Jean-Louis Mathieu, Valais AOC
- Château du Crest Sauvignon 2022 Domaine Château du Crest, Genève AOC
The full results of the World Sauvignon Blanc competition are available here.
