Cellars in the sky awards 2009

Who took the accolades in our annual airline wine awards? Sara Turner reveals all Representing the best in-flight wines served last year, Cellars in the Sky rewards the airlines’ wine choices in business and first class. After months of organisation, more than 220 bottles were intensively blind tasted over two days. Our five judges were Charles Metcalfe, TV wine presenter and co-chairman of the International Wine Challenge; Joanna Simon, co-founder of the Wine Gang (thewinegang.com), author, and wine and food editor for House and Garden magazine; Sam Harrop, Master of Wine and winemaking consultant; Derek Smedley, Master of Wine for more than 40 years, consultant and co-chairman of the International Wine Challenge; and Tim Atkin, Master of Wine, wine columnist for The Observer, co-chairman of the International Wine Challenge and co-founder of the Wine Gang. An awards ceremony was held on February 9 at the Business Travel and Meetings Show at London’s Earls Court, where the winning airlines were presented with their trophies by Charles Metcalfe. The Business Traveller team followed up with a special tasting of the winning wines for attendees of our stand at the show.

How do airlines pick their wines?

Many airlines conduct their own blind tastings. Cathay Pacific, for example, has wine sent from around the world to its base in Hong Kong, employing three wine consultants to make the final choices – Roy Moorfield from Australia, Vic Williams from New Zealand and local wine critic Chi-Sun Lau. The tasting panel meets about five times a year to select the vintages, which, depending on the type, will be served over a few months or a few years. Cathay has about 20 different categories of wine to select, depending on route and class. Clara Yip, assistant manager of beverage and catering supplies for Cathay, says it is important to get the right bottles on board. “Wine is a very important part of our in-flight experience, as is food,” she says. “Wine drinking is becoming more and more popular in our region, and as the local market matures, our passengers are getting more knowledgeable. They are interested in our wine selection and care about the way it is served on board.” Air Astana sources wines from local suppliers and then holds blind tastings of about 40 vintages with its board members, senior managers and frequent flyers. “This democratic process is the key influence on the choice of wines offered, with due consideration given to the overall mix of passengers – the majority being Kazakh and European,” says Graham Hobbs, manager of catering and logistics for the carrier. SAS works with TV wine presenter Oz Clarke in its selection process, a relationship that arose after Clarke complained about the quality of the Scandinavian carrier’s wines during a Business Traveller Cellars in the Sky tasting in the eighties. This year, SAS won the Best Business Class White category, with a 2007 Tim Adams Semillon from Clare Valley, Australia. “SAS is lucky because it is not from a wine-producing region, so there is no pressure to use local wines,” Clarke says. “People are high up in the sky, stressed, and they need to be calmed down with a good glass of wine. We want ours to refresh you.” Clarke also tries to work with up-and-coming wine makers. “It’s tough getting started in the business and if they get put on a plane it gives them a great opportunity,” he says. SAS buys more than 130,000 bottles of red and white wine every year. Andrea Robinson, Delta’s master sommelier, says she often tries to match wine to the end destination, so passengers can start their travelling experience on the plane – for example, a good Rioja on flights to Spain. She also likes to choose wine from both “world class and classical regions, along with cutting-edge and rising star areas”, with “a little bit of something for everybody on board… Our goal is to represent destinations that capture the imagination.” Robinson thinks wine is a critical part of the in-flight experience. She says: “If you think about the pleasures of the table, wine is a really key part of it. And it’s such an interactive experience in terms of service because when the crew are attending to the passengers they’re bringing the wine and presenting it and telling them about it.” She adds that the announcement of the Cellars in the Sky winners is always an exciting time of the year. “It’s something that keeps us on our toes. This market place is a competitive one and these things can be monumental in terms of making the product and the experience memorable,” she says.

Which wines do well?

When tasting, the judges are looking for something that will work well in the air. This means a red wine that doesn’t have too much tannin, as the drying effect can be more pronounced at 35,000 feet, and a white that is not too acidic, as this will also be more apparent. For this reason, grapes that tend to be favoured by the judges are riesling for white wines and pinot noir for reds. For the judging panel, there are often tough decisions to be made, not least because the tastings are completely blind – unusual for a wine competition, says Harrop. “It’s very difficult for us because we are given no information about the wine,” he says. “In most tastings, we choose the best example of one type of wine from a particular region. Here we know nothing. It’s all about the best wines overall and, of course, the best in the air. Cellars in the Sky is a special competition.”

How the winners were chosen

The tastings were held at boutique hotel Malmaison in London’s Charterhouse Square on October 22 and 23, but the planning started long before then. We contacted more than 65 airlines in the summer, inviting them to enter two white wines, two red wines, one sparkling and one fortified or sweet wine, from both business and first class. Airlines didn’t have to enter all the categories, but to be eligible for “Best Cellar” they had to submit at least one red, one white and one sparkling. The wines were then shipped to the Business Traveller office to be unpacked, labelled and reboxed according to category and class. During the tastings, the wines were given a mark out of 20, with anything under ten being deemed undrinkable. The final results were an average of all the judges’ marks. The competition took more than eight months to organise, so here’s a toast to the judges, the Malmaison and its staff, and all the participating airlines.

Airlines that entered

Cellars in the Sky Awards 2009 saw 34 airlines take part. These were Aer Lingus, Air Astana, Air Baltic, Air Canada, Air New Zealand, Alitalia, American Airlines, ANA, Austrian Airlines, Bmi, British Airways, Brussels Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Delta Air Lines, Emirates, Etihad Airways, Finnair, Gulf Air, Iberia, Japan Airlines, Jet Airways, Kenya Airways, KLM, Korean Air, LAN, Lufthansa, Mexicana, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Scandinavian Airlines, Singapore Airlines, South African Airways, TAM Airlines and US Airways. For a full list of winning wines and placed airlines in each category, click here.