Sommelier horror stories—and the strategies to avoid starring in them
Don’t Be That Guy
By Paul Wetterau
Authority-by-the-Sea: Thomas Perez, who manages the wine supply at Carmel’s L’Auberge, Bouchée and Cantinetta Luca, is very well versed on how to maximize an evening’s enjoyment.
A customer obviously fighting with his date pounds his expensive wine like it’s water. As he stands in the middle of the famous local restaurant and turns for the door, he appears to get the spins, and suddenly barfs – right in the middle of their table.
On another occasion, a veteran sommelier is asked for an ice bucket. Puzzled, he supplies it, and then can only shake his head in disbelief when he sees the couple spitting their wine into a bucket, during dinner, in the center of the dining room.
Then, there’s this winner: A customer pays the $30 corkage fee per bottle and brings in two cases of Two Buck Chuck for his party of 30 at Pacific’s Edge Restaurant, a long-time winner of Wine Spectator’s Grand Award.
Some wine faux pas, like these, are more dramatic than others – the people spilling wine out of their glass because they swirled too hard is lame, but not as egregious as some missteps. Even the most minor wine crimes take their toll on sommeliers and, perhaps more cruelly, they drive wine pros insane more slowly.
This writer-sommelier spoke with a collection of distinguished local sommeliers to learn how to help Weeklyreaders avoid perpetrating those crimes. The guidelines serve as a reminder that a peek into wine culture often indicates that behaviors that seem snobby and symbolic on the surface have key functions that contribute to a better experience.
Decant with discretion
“A lot of people feel like they need to decant wine, when really, they don’t,” says Eli Seversen, wine steward at Rio Grill. “I’ve seen older wines fall apart because they’ve been decanted. Everyone wants to decant wine and, quite frankly, it’s a bad idea, and a little annoying.”
It’s the cork that counts
Severson has seen it before. “Unfortunately, there’s a misconception,” he says. “People taste the wine to see if they like it. This isn’t supposed to happen. They’re supposed to be tasting the wine to see if it’s corked.”
Adds Gabe Georis, general manager of Casanova restaurant, whose cellar has earned placement on the Wine Spectator’s Grand Award Wine List since the early ‘90s, “[Customers] think that the first taste is to determine whether or not you like the wine. It’s not. It’s to check to see if the wine smells musty. Other common flaws: red wine shouldn’t taste fizzy, white wine shouldn’t be brown, and no wine should be undrinkable.”
Sniff the right stuff
Sometimes, with older bottles, corks will disintegrate over time – the cork can smell bad and can even break apart. But that offers nothing definitive: The wine can still be very delicious. Georis puts it succinctly: “A big faux pas is smelling the cork.”
Decrease the grease
Just looking at a wine can reveal a lot about the climate it came from, its alcohol levels and its age. That’s hard to do when the glass is covered in fingerprints and reduction sauce. Handling wine glasses by the stem prevents this from happening.
Don’t turn water to wine
“Some customers feel the need to put water in their wine glasses before tasting a new wine,” says Thomas Perez, wine director of L’Auberge, Bouchée, and Cantinetta Luca. “What they don’t realize is, water dilutes the taste and aroma of the wine.”
Don’t show off
Dining is supposed to be fun, not a mental joust between the sommelier and the customer – and erroneous declarations will not be corrected out of class, giving them unwarranted extended life. “When I approach the table, I assume the customer knows more about wine than I do,” says Marc Buzan, wine director at Pacific’s Edge. “You never know who you’re dealing with.
“[But] some people are incorrect with the facts they believe to be truthful. In my position, you don’t want to bruise any egos. One time, this customer told me he’d taken a wine appreciation course. After that, he pointed to the wine that he wanted [on the winelist] and mispronounced the winery’s name.”
Be real
Don’t let an unrealistic outlook eclipse reality. One local sommelier at a high-end restaurant remembers a customer ordering the cheapest bottle of wine on the list. After pouring the customer a sip, he scoffed, raised his nose in the air and declared that the wine didn’t meet his expectations. “What did he expect when he ordered the cheapest bottle on the list?” the sommelier asks.
Balance with brains
Generally speaking, it’s best to have your wine be sweeter than your dessert (wedding cake can make any fine wine taste bad). Ice cream and Cabernet aren’t tasty together. Furthermore, even some dessert wines aren’t sweet enough. “One time these customers were having a chocolate dessert and a customer asked if a Sauternes would be a good pairing,” says Perez, who replied, “I wouldn’t do that.” He offered another option. “I gave him some Banyuls (a fig-like dessert wine from southeastern France). That wine is like sauce for that dessert. I can drink Sauternes any day of the week, but not in that situation,” says Perez.
Similarly, keep Cabernet away from light and delicate items. “Kampachi [baby yellowtail] tuna with cabernet is real trouble,” Perez says. “The palate cries, ‘Oooh man, that hurts.’ You need something with lower alcohol. Believe it or not, I’ve heard people say, ‘Gimme a Bordeaux with that,’ which has to be the worst pairing imaginable.”
Expect expertise
Help the sommelier do his or her job. “The easiest way for a customer to be rubbed wrong is by a stuck-up or snooty sommelier or by being made to feel foolish, or inadequate as far as spending,” Georis says.
To combat this, says Perez, who holds a degree in Enology from Spain’s University of Rioja, ask for ample reason why it’s worth your investment. “If [a sommelier] is going to push a customer,” he says, “the sommelier should at least have 10 reasons why they should purchase that wine.”
Don’t make baaaad decisions
In other words, don’t be a sheep. Doug Frost, Master Sommelier and Master of Wine, one of only three people in the world to hold both the titles, phrases it like this: “The biggest wine faux pas of all is not drinking the wine that you like,” he says. “Sometimes people are railroaded into drinking something they don’t like because some critic told them that it was good.”