Gault&Millau launches its first Romanian wine guide and aims to promote local wines on the international market

Gault & Millau, the first international gourmet guide, launched the first edition of the guide dedicated to Romanian wines and brings to Romania the international expertise of the company in the field. The Gault & Millau Romanian Wine Guide 2019 includes 152 wines from 63 wineries.

The highest score of a Romanian wine in the Gault & Millau ranking is 94 points out of 100, for 2016 Smerenie from the Oprisor winery, which also received the award for Best Red Wine.

22 Romanian wines achieved a score of over 90 points, including red, white, rose and sweet wines, made of international but also indigenous varieties. This performance demonstrates the complexity of the market, the quality of local wine industry and its competitiveness.

”Romanian wine has a potential in which we believe and that is why we launched the guide Gault & Millau for local wines. The principles from which we started are transparent and clear, developed in over 30 years of Gault & Millau experience in this field: independent expertise, neutrality to the commercial interests of the market, constructive approach, equal chances in the evaluation process for all manufacturers regardless of their size. The next step after this launch is to promote the Romanian wines selected in the guide and their producers both in Romania and at international level, ”said Raluca Hritcu and Stefan Mortici, co-CEO of Gault & Millau Romania.

The wines of the 2019 edition of the Gault & Millau Romania Guide were evaluated by a team of 3 experts which have the highest possible certifications in the oenological field: Ana Sapungiu (Master of Wine), Caroline Gilby (Master of Wine) and Isa Bal (Master Sommelier).

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The three evaluators contributed with complementary perspectives but also with in-depth knowledge of the local market, which allowed them to position local wines in the international context.

The most important conclusion of this first edition of the guide is that local varieties represent an asset for Romania on the global wine market, including Feteasca Neagra or Alb & Negru de Dragasani, or some lesser-known varieties like Zghihara de Husi.

Gault & Millau guide for Romanian wines will be launched in Paris on December 8 and presented in Bordeaux in February 2019 at the Cite du Vin, one of the most important wine fairs in the world, both projects taking place at Saison France-Roumanie.

The guide will be promoted throughout the Gault & Millau network both in Europe and in the extra-European space (Australia, Canada, Japan) through events, articles about selected wines and interviews with Romanian producers. 

Gault & Millau is the first international gourmet guide to enter the Romanian market. The guide was first published in France 50 years ago by two passionate journalists – Henri Gault and Christian Millau.

Over time, the guide has proved successful on the international market, with Gault & Millau now in over 30 countries and 6 continents.

In Romania, Gault & Millau has published in May 2018 the first local gourmet guide – a selection of 141 restaurants and POPs in Bucharest and five other cities in the country.