When the most momentous wine tasting in history was held, in June 1976 at the Intercontinental Hotel in Paris, the result was assumed to be a foregone conclusion - even by its organiser, the expatriate English wine merchant Steven Spurrier. The dapper 34-year-old and his assistant Patricia Gallagher had decided to lay on a blind tasting, pitting what were considered the world's greatest wines - a quartet of top Left Bank Bordeaux from the 1970 vintage and four leading domaine white burgundies - against little-known upstarts from California. Everyone - Spurrier, Gallagher and the other judges, drawn from the French wine aristocracy of estate owners, sommeliers, and writers - was certain that France would win hands down.

Instead Stag's Leap Wine Cellars Cabernet 1973 from the Napa Valley beat all the Bordeaux first and second-growths. Another Napa wine, Chateau Montelena Chardonnay 1973, defeated the Cote de Beaune grands and premiers crus. When the judges saw the results, there were undignified scenes, with attempts at last-minute fudging of scores. The only journalist to witness the tasting, George Taber from Time, duly relayed the sensational upset to the world.