Re NYers or CAians being more sophisticated about wine: I remember getting in conversation some years ago with a guy in Santa Barbara who appeared to be a construction worker or something like that–yet his views on wine were very sophisticated. Must have been an Ur-Berserker, come to think of it.
I agree, I’m only guessing, but as others have noted above, this does truly surprise me.
I saw this and thought it strange and started to comment but then I figured I would leave it alone. But she must have been blind when she lived in NY.
Every time I bring up the idea of BYOB to my non-wine geek friends it’s taken as a complete foreign concept to them. I guess this is why I assume it is mostly geeks with cellars that BYOB. But I’ll defer to those more knowledgable.
Yup.
I have heard six different stories (from real retailers who are not SPECULATING) of people stopping at wine shops in Seattle on their way to the fanciest restaurant in town with the cheapest possible bottle in hand.
While I don’t agree that it’s so foreign in NYC, location definitely makes a difference on this question. I always thought of BYO as most common in CA until I started spending time in Philly, where the difficulty of the PA liquor laws has made it a BYO mecca. Tons of really good, relatively fancy restaurants are BYO only. Many wine collectors taking advantage of this, sure, but tons and tons of every day restaurant-goers stopping at the wine store on the way, or even bringing beer and/or spirits. Even at places that actually have a liquor license, it’s common (if permitted) - it’s just the mindset here.
And, FWIW, I have also heard tons of somms exclaim on how often they see Yellowtail or similar come in the door. In NY, when I call to ask about corkage, I make a point of saying that I am a wine collector and would like to bring something aged and special. The answer often changes from no to yes upon hearing that.
Not to continue to hijack the thread, but . . .
I guess some folks just want to have a bottle, and really don’t ‘care’ what’s inside of it.
In addition, there are plenty of great ‘supermarket’ wines that most consumers will get great joy out of drinking - and that would NOT necessarily get any more pleasure out of drinking something more expensive.
To me, there is nothing wrong with that, and it should be ‘embraced’. To me, a good somm would ‘accept’ this other bottle, and then perhaps offer free pours of a wine that they have open BTG to compare/contrast or to go ‘better’ with the meals purchased. We all know that most restaurants cover their costs of BTG purchases as soon as that first glass is purchased, so it’s gravy after that.
Just a thought . . .
I actually was an offender of this recently. After a matinee show in SF last month we decided spur of the moment to go out for dinner with the kids. So I stopped at Arlequin and picked up an '07 Grivot Vosne villages, and brought this to the restaurant. Not really with the idea that it would save money, but because I wanted a good burg with dinner and the little bistro we went to didn’t have any on their list that looked interesting. When the server was opening the bottle table side, my daughter looked up and said, “Dad, isn’t that the bottle that you just…” I quickly cut her off and redirected her. Phew! So, guilty as charged. Every other time, though, it’s from my collection.
Your initial instinct was correct. She’s ridiculing people for bringing their own bottles to the type of restaurants where she plies her trade. I can see both sides of it - the irritation she feels when a patron of an establishment revered for its wine service ignores her expertise and also the “wait, what?” reaction of those who may not have known it irritates Somms completely when their sphere is circumvented in this way.
I’m sure this happens - but it’s the exception to a rule. Trendy restaurants by in large attract a smart, relatively well-heeled constituent. For the most part, this type - even if somewhat ignorant about wine - will attempt to educate themselves past generics for the occasion. Acquaintances of mine in the Philly restaurant business agree and remark often that their diners seem to drink very well. That they’re constantly being turned on to interesting wines and producers because of them.
I am not sure that what I am about to say fits perfectly with the Kelli White story, but it is so that nothing pisses off somms like customers who school them. Somms do not always grasp that they are there most of the time for those who know little or nothing about wine and want to learn. Given the average age of somms these days, they may take a beating both from customers who know more than they do and those who are bringing their own Yellowtail. Since in many cases they are paid and tipped based upon the wine that they move, frustration is going to be part of the job description…
Good for her! Napa represent!
+1
And Bill, though we may not agree on some things, this is really well said.
While very few will ever school a Somm on Kelli White’s level, I agree that a certain annoyance with customers who negate their function is just expected. I have no problem with it to be honest.
Rick, I don’t think you should feel remarkably sheepish about picking up a nice bottle that you wanted on the way to dinner. So long as it wasn’t on their list, I think whether the bottle came from your collection or the wine shop five minutes ago is immaterial, right? Last time I was in SF we stopped off at Arlequin on the way to Mission Street Chinese–I sure didn’t feel any guilt about paying that $8 corkage and enjoying those bottles!
I am not sure why you would think that there are not plenty of people out there who can school most somms, Matthew. Not across all wines, of course, but definitely for the wines that a given patron collects and drinks the most of (and is most likely to bring and/or drink in her presence, or any other somm’s presence). Understanding wine is, after all, purely a function of drinking (NOT tasting, actually), reading and discussion. Anybody can do it. Kelli is not old enough to have decades of experience with most of the wines she sells, and she sells a lot of wines at PRESS that have not even been MADE for decades! She “curates”, as somms and reviewers pretentiously love to say, a CA-only list. That surely does not define her experience base, but it does reflect a recent concentration in the wines of a single state. Trust me when I tell you that I can school Kelli White in Piemontese wines. She cannot even source some that I drink. Likewise, I have maybe three bottles of CA wines in my cellar at this point, so, were I interested, I am equally sure that she could school me in CA wines.
There needs to be a dose of reality injected into all of this. At best, wine reviewers and somms are people with a passion for wine who set about tasting as many wines as they can, sometimes adding a dubious wine educational credential, but most often not. Kelli has paid plenty of dues in retail, and that is not to be sneezed at. No doubt that she has tasted thousands of wines that I have not, but importantly, have not wanted to, either. The real advantage of a good somm or good wine reviewer (I am not yet prepared to concede that the latter exists, by the way!) is that the individual may have experience with wines that you or I do not, and want to try. A second advantage of a GREAT somm, and there are far fewer of those than the self-reinforcing somm community would have us believe, is that the somm constantly samples menu choices and develops skill at helping patrons pair wine and food, which for me, given my decades of experience with fine wine, is the far more important somm function, and one which requires a greater gift than simply recommending wines.
In my neck of the woods in Italy, there are few somms. Instead, the host/maitre d’, typically the individual or a member of the family who owns and operates the restaurant, “curates” the wine cellar and recommends pairings with dishes that, in many cases, the person has lifelong experience with (his or her mama or nonna being in the kitchen perhaps). A far cry from a two-somm and one somm-in-waiting at PRESS, but one that delivers the sort of exhilarating experience that somms everywhere should deliver, but too often do not…
Matthew - I agree with Bill. I don’t know Kelli but
Kelli: Coming from New York where people never bring wines to restaurants, it’s hard for me to understand the culture of corkage in California.
It’s hard for me to understand that statement. I know I’m in the minority, but it’s been many years since I bought something off a restaurant list. I knew a number of restaurants in NYC, sold to them and have many friends in the business and it wouldn’t occur to me NOT to bring my wine. Especially when I have a wine maker in tow! So I don’t know what world she was living in.
Second, what Bill said so well.
It’s not to knock the somms and MWs and diploma people and all the rest, but after a certain amount of wine in your life you’re just not interested in someone’s latest discovery. “I just discovered this new grape that’s been used for 3000 years”.
And that may be the issue. Someone who wants to know more about wine but only knows that they like Chardonnay and Pinot Noir might be really interested in that new grape that’s only been around for eons and that’s only “new” because it’s not Cab, Merlot, Pinot Noir, or Chardonnay. That’s a good thing overall and that person is the audience for most soms.
To the extent that said person is going to develop a real interest in wine, that’s great. But I can think of only a handful of soms that I respect enough to try a wine based on their recommendation. Other than that, I guess there are hundreds of people Vinous could add. Not sure why I would particularly care though.
One other observation about somms: they sell wine for a living, just like retailers. Indeed, many, if not most (and Kelli White is a good example), come out of wine retail, and worse, they are buying wholesale and selling at a MULTIPLE of retail (itself often a wildly inflated number relative to actual sales prices).
There is an inherent conflict of interest in that. It is in the restaurant owner’s best interest, and thus, also in the somm’s best interest, to overfill glasses of the most expensive wine possible, not to push the great $25 Beaujolais that the somm discovered last year. I understand that such behavior is more likely to be exhibited by waitstaff at your local Olive Garden than by somms at most serious restaurants, but let’s be honest, it happens. (Will we ever forget the $37.50 Screagle? http://www.nj.com/business/index.ssf/20 … cart_river) It is simply that a somm must find buyers for both the cheap and the expensive bottles to survive, which is a hell of a lot easier at expense-account joints like Veritas, PRESS and French Laundry than it is a the best Northern Italian restaurant in Ft. Wayne, Indiana (assuming that there is one!). The conflict of interest is obvious and de facto disclosed, in that every patron understands who is paying the somm’s salary, and it is probably no worse than the incestuous relationship among wine retailers and wine reviewers that fuels score inflation and purple prose in the never-ending Battle for Shelf Talkers With My Name On Them, but there is really no incentive for somms to serve up $25-50 wines that will knock your socks off in most situations.
I will also look on, with interest but perhaps with some initial skepticism, as Kelli shares her decanting expertise. Pat Burton and I have spent many hours and opened many bottles of high-quality Nebbiolo-based wines in the effort to document the quasi-scientific notion that “slow-o” rarely cuts the mustard for Nebbiolo of any age, and that extended air time and decanting, sometimes over days in extreme cases, are often required, a belief confirmed by a growing number of the wisest, most experienced Nebbiolo voices as well. (There is now also growing evidence that some Burgundies may behave similarly.) Unless patrons buy wines in advance of their visit to a restaurant, there is no possibility that certain wines can be aerated and served in optimal condition, as they can at home. To be sure, wine geeks do befriend somms, and somms arrange tastings and dinners, most often BYO, where the wines can be aerated and decanted to the patron’s specifications, and somms must do as one asks (or as the somm recommends with the patron’s assent) if the bottle is prepaid. Proper aeration and decanting are perhaps the two most important aspects of enjoying age-worthy fine wine, absolutely eclipsing wine glass size and shape and even temperature, as important as that can be. (Temperature can always be raised or lowered. There is no such cure for wine that has had too much or too little air at the time of drinking in a restaurant.) Yet, the levels of both experimentation and ignorance among drinkers of expensive wines remains legion. I applaud Vinous for hiring someone who will at least attempt to address the subject intelligently (which I have never seen a wine reviewer do, by the way)…
My goodness, what a tempest in a Tempranillo glass!
ex-somm (1): Working at a classy Napa joint built around wine, it’s annoying when folks bring in supermarket bottles. When I worked at a classy NY joint built around wine, that didn’t happen so much.
Somehow she’s insulted Californians, lied about this even happening in CA, and lied about it not happening in NY. And that’s before all the bloviation on how pathetically little somms know compared to their patrons. And hey, if they were merely useless stuffed shifts who don’t know their proper place, no big deal; but no, they’re actually a menace to the dining public, forcing folks into only the priciest bottles.
Just… wow!
I was only peripherally aware of Ms. White before this week. Now I feel compelled to root for her.
(1) young, female
+1 and eloquently put.
Depressingly regular occurence on this board.
If you can’t really attack the person’s career/expertise (possibly because you have never heard of her before) well then, by all means, take one or two of her sentences out of context, conflate those with the person as a whole, and cut the person down to size by critiquing her out of context quote.