Chefs Have Awful Taste in Wine

It's true.

I've worked for a CIA-trained chef in California who drank 375's of Port like a little girl - yeah, he drank 10 at a click and would end up shooting someone in the ass with a BB gun, but still.

Your Pegasus called, little girl, it would like you to brush its glorious mane.

Another chef, a nationally acclaimed sushi savant, favored Rosenblum Zinfandel when I met him. He's since graduated, but with a slow and painstaking babystepping that he probably never, ever had to endure in his Japanese food training.

Just because you've got a preternatural sense for fish doesn't mean you're ready for Burgundy, Daniel-sahn.

The third chef...forget it. Beer. I love good beer, but this is about wine.

So when I come across shit like this:

"Chef Kent (Rathbun, of Dallas fame and Austin jeering) Recommends"

I wet myself with glee. Let's look at the flavor/texture profiles of his favorite wines, yes?

Whites:
Amayna, Chardonnay, Leyda Valley, Chile 2006
Domaine Chandon, étoile , Rosé, Sonoma-Napa County
MacMurray Ranch, Pinot Gris, Sonoma Coast
Patz and Hall, Chardonnay, Alder Springs Vineyard, Rutherford
Roederer Estate, Brut, Anderson Valley NV
Rubicon Estate, Roussanne-Viognier-Marsanne, Blancaneaux, Rutherford
St. Supéry, Sémillon-Sauvingnon [sic] Blanc, Virtú, Napa Valley

So from this, I take it this guy's bag is a giant bucket of buttered popcorn topped with oak chips and a copy of Wine Spectator with which he can wipe his glistening craw.

Not a single Old-World-style wine among them, which has become, for me, synonymous with a lighter, better balanced, often subtler experience.

If I had more time and weren't just writing this to blow off steam between tasks on my steps-to-fucking-Shangri-La-sized to-do list, I'd thoughtfully consider the notion that chefs' palates suffer from an eventual blanding - a phenom that explains why so many guests find things saltier than the chef can taste. Anyone out there know the results of studies done to this effect? Like I said, I'm busy with an actual job. Let the geeks do the work and spittle all over my shirt while they tell me about it.

His red selection is even worse. I won't go into it.

The point of this instruction today is: Don't give a fucking rat's ass what the chef likes to drink. If it were up to him, he'd be passed out in the walk-in with an empty case of cherry Robitussin and an underaged Thai hooker.

But...Where's the Wood?

: I want a glass of wine, but I don't know any of these.

Me: What do you normally like to drink, even though I know you are going to say "Oaky Cab Sauvs"?

: Oaky Cab Sauvs.

Me:




: ...


Me: We don't have one of those. But try this (pouring a taste of Carneros Pinot Noir and a Valpolicella Ripasso). The first one has the style you want, but the second has the weight.



: Hmmm...um...uhn...

Me: Okay, try this. I normally don't go in for Mendoza Malbec, but this one is really balanced. It won't be oaky but it is stylistically and weight-wise the closest thing you're going to get to what you normally like. And hey, why not try something new?

: Hunh....mmmm....ssssooo confuuuused....must...have...oak!

Me: Or let's do something totally different but that you'll love: a Montepulciano d'Abruzzo. It's like cocoa-dusted raspberries and—

: Raspberries?!?! In WINE?!

: You do know wine is made from grapes, right?



: I'd never think of raspberries and wine...or cocoa...and WINE?

Me: There's a lot of fruit to smell in wine when there isn't a whole forest of oak to mask it.

: But oaky wines are always the most expensive.

Me: Yes! You've hit upon something that's very controversial in the wine industry. It's the effort on the part of winemakers to please Robert Parker and his peers, a bizarre oligarchy of mouths that only respond to oak, plum, coffee, chocolate, smoke, and—provided there's enough of the stuff I just mentioned—tobacco. So any wine forcibly made to taste like these things get higher points and higher prices.

: (Pointing to a funky, poopy-licious biodynamic Rhône Syrah on the menu). I'll just have the Syrah. Is that like a Shiraz?


: Yes. Yes it is.

And Please Don't Do This, Either

There's this new one I get all the time, and - surprise! - it really pisses me off.
It's this: How come you know so much about wine?

I get this from probably 1-2 guests per night, or 4-6 per week. It's like a UTI that just won't clear up. You start to feel relaxed again, the wincing pain in the vajayzer has begun to subside and then - WHAMMO. How come you know so much about wine?

Lists calm me down, so here's a list of Reasons This Makes Me Crazy:

1) I don't know so much about wine. You just know that little. And that's okay, but what you are implying by How Come...? is that I shouldn't know something you don't, OR that wine is a subject upon which you think you should be an expert, and therefore, it's bewildering that you aren't, even though you read Wine Spectator in your podiatrist's office.

2) Because it's my job, dumbass. What do you do for a living? Well gosh, I hope you know some shit about it.

3) Because I give a care. I realize that in this town, most servers are stoned, hungover, or between 12-step meetings, but I do it because I stupidly believe in the restaurant I work for, and I stupidly believe I can change someone's life by getting them to drink Lagrein from Alto Adige instead of California Merlot. Stupid stupid stupid.

4) If you walk into a nice-looking restaurant with a "challenging" menu that changes daily and a wine list full of names you've never heard of, chances are, you're not at a fucking Burger King. Are you really surprised that the server knows "so much about wine"? How about the fact that they know the steak is dry-aged, the difference between a rabbit rillette and rabbit confit, and where the oysters are from? Is that shocking to you?

5) Oh yeah, stop asking me "REAL RABBIT?" as if that's the craziest thing you've ever heard of. Well, it probably is if you eat at Burger King all the time.

6) Every single person who asks me why I know so much about wine totally ignores my advice anyway. Then they ask me a series of even dumber questions designed to give them a chance to participate, like "What's your favorite? Mine's La Crema;" or "I bet you're a red girl, huh?" Shut up and drink what I told you to get and let's have a conversation about that instead. It's going to be much more interesting than whatever brilliant gem you gleaned from the latest mid-rate freelancer's article in GQ.
<-- Is totes down with Lagrein. "It's so plummy but not overly extracted, and the long, lean, herbal finish is tits!"

The long story is: I "know so much about wine" because I have an obsessive-compulsive attraction to things that can be classified. I also have been with a sommelier for the last 4 years who is a walking encyclopedia of wine, so I made him teach me everything he knows. But I did all this because I love to learn and because I use it in my profession, and want one to benefit from the other. And if you're going to do anything - stuff envelopes, catch fish, sell wine, make wine - go big or go home.

So quit asking me stupid questions, dispense with your weird hang ups and insecurity issues and drink the "weird" Lagrein. You'll thank me one day.

Sweet Berry Wine!

Today in Thanks Yelp A**hole, Next Time I'll Just Ask My Dog:

"The wine was light and had a strong fruit/berry flavor."

This might be a good time to revisit John C. Reilly's best work ever ever!

From Cosmo to Chablis in 60 seconds

"I'll have a cosmo," said the woman I waited on last night. We only have a beer and wine list, and I told her so.
"If you were in the mood for a cosmo, I'd suggest one of our rosés. We have several by the glass, and some have this great red fruitiness that--"
"NO," she waved her hands around. "I don't want sweet." Said the woman who asked for a cosmo.

I explained that rosés aren't sweet, that she's thinking of spending her teenage years parked outside a DQ with a 40-oz. styro of Boone's Farm warming up on the dashboard. Well, I didn't say so in as many words.

Dumbass.

I brought her a taste anyway, of Chateau d'Oupia, a wonderful Languedoc rosé with a coy strawberry smile and creamy little tongue. A whisper of granite on the finish gives it elegance and beauty, keeps it from being too slutty.

"Nah," said the woman. "I think I'll just have this Chablis." A Chablis that's like licking an oyster shell dipped in lime juice.

You know, I give up listening to people tell me what the fuck they want. They don't even know.

Week in Wankers

Everyone was pretty well-behaved this last Friday night. I think it's because my new engagement ring is shaped like brass knuckles and could totally cut a bitch.

Oh, but there was this:

Guest: So this rosé is made with what again?

Me: Pinot Noir.

Guest: (Blank stare at glass full of salmon-colored rosé) So is it red?

Me: Pinot Noir is just the grape - it can be used in red, rosé, and Champagne. Champagnes are frequently made with it. The juice inside is white; it's the skins that are red.

Guest: Okay. So what do you call this?

Me: Rosé. Made from Pinot Noir. (It was actually Sinskey's very fine vin gris, but if I went into this, the poor guy's head would have rocketed off into space)

We've a long ways to go. I want to start by getting everyone to stop talking about varietals until they have a better grasp of wine.
It's gotten so bad that whenever someone sits down and says "I want a Pinot," I say, "No, you don't."

If you don't believe me, I give them a hot-climate Grenache/Syrah blend instead, and they love it.

Week in Wankers

1. "This wine list is expensive. I just want a good merlot for under $20."

Bobo. Come on. Think back to a time when you found a merlot for under $20. It was an something like an aisle, wasn't it? With other products for sale around you? Yeah, we call that a store.

Restaurants buy wine at a wholesale price, just like stores do. Both places, in order to make any profit, have to sell that wine to the public at a higher cost. Since restaurants (theoretically) move less of the product than a retail store will (add to that the greater cost of running a restaurant versus a retail shop: paying the servers who open it, serving it in glassware we bought and have to pay dishwashers and a water bill to wash), and you end up with pricing that looks like this:
$15 wholesale cost of a bottle --> $22-25 retail (at a steal)
$32-36 on a restaurant wine list

That means, in order to find a $20 merlot at a restaurant, that piece of shit has to run about $8 wholesale. If you would pick up said piece of shit in a store, it would be about $13.

Your friends hate you for bringing cheap, shitty wine to their dinner parties, by the way.



2. Then there's the loudmouthed frat boy fresh out of his MBA program who interrupts me as I'm describing the food and wine on the menus to make embarrassingly erroneous claims such as:

• hanger steak is right here, where the flank is (pats my side - no seriously, the douchebag touches me. If this were a strip club, the little bastard would have two fingers broken before being tossed onto the street.)
• we didn't like this Cote du Rhone-Villages. Do you have any just Cote du Rhone? That's like saying "Fuck this Cadillac, do you have a GM?" Moron.
  
• (after I describe another Rhone as being kind of stinky, barnyardy goodness and his friends ask what that means exactly) Oh, lots of wine people describe wines as being stinky, it's like cow poop, you know? (Jesus, I hope you're not an MBA now that I hear you try to sales pitch your tablemates)

3. Another server had some name-dropping nitwit going "blah blah Sea Smoke blah blah Kistler...I never buy anything less than $50 retail."
His girlfriend looks at the rest of the table and says "Can you believe he's only known about wine for three months?"

Really. That long?

Alice Feiring

This has nothing to do with waitressing and a whole lot to do with wine writers. Specifically, self-serving, self-obsessed, self-congratulatory wine writers named Alice Feiring.

It's funny, this love/hate thing I have with Alice. We see totally eye-to-eye in our almost psychotic hatred and fear of the New World, in our edict that small and rustic is never small and rustic enough, and in our overwhelming preference to drink something really weird and not necessarily tasty, over something that is ordinary but goes down easily.

In other words, if I were going to share a bottle of the spiky, peppered-bramble juice that is Pineau d'Aunis, it would be with her.

But between her outrageously self-important book, How I Saved the World From Parkerization (she didn't), and this month's article in Saveur (specifically where she implicates herself in Il Buco's decision to place teeny Sagrantino producer Ruggeri on its wine list), I am very, very scared for Alice.

This woman is going to float off into the stratosphere with that enormous head of hers!

She's the egomaniacal Hindenburg, perhaps having passed even Donald Trump and half the Real Housewives of the OC on her ascent to sociopathy. Someone needs to load her down with more weight, say a reality check.

I propose that Alice shadow me on a Saturday night at my restaurant, enduring plaintive moans about there being no California on the list, or smart-ass retorts to my speech about our localvore menu such as "Well, then where's the Texas wine?" (Oh, please Jesus, let that just be a smart-ass retort and not an actual request.) I bet after a night of explaining that Cahors is where Malbec originated, not Argentina, and that it won't be anything like the tarry, oaky fruitbomb they know from the grocery store Mendozas, Alice will tear her own hair out and throw her hands up. There's a long long way to go, sister. You didn't save the world from anyone yet. You're a little less FDR and a little more Obama-first-90-days. Sure you want the job?

I appreciate that she keeps trying. And if there's a clown on our side vying for a drop in the dunk tank, so much the better. After all, we can't always hate on Robert Parker alone. That's shooting fish in a barrel.

So, thanks, Alice, for offering yourself up to some entertaining obloquy with your unparalleled claims to being the übergeek that will deliver us all from the tyranny of Wine Speculator and the populace's love of mass-produced, boring, hyper-regulated juice. You're kind of like the Bill Maher of wine. I appreciate you both, but you kind of embarrass the team sometimes.

Love the wine in yourself; not yourself in the wine.

A Tuscan Parable

Once upon a time in Tuscany, a winemaker learned that a large number of his wines were being sold in a peculiar, much overlooked part of the United States. The middle of Texas, of all places! Intrigued by this far away land and its people - who so obviously enjoyed his wines - he set off for a visit.
With two compatriots, he visited the restaurant in Texas that was responsible for the bulk of his sales. They sat in a quiet booth in the back and sampled some other bottles on the wine list from reputable Tuscan producers. They feasted, and racked up a bill over $400.

The winemaker paid. He left $40 as a tip for his server.

Just under 10%. For excellent service.

The winemaker didn't seem to realize that the reason his wine was selling so well was not because of the importer who brought it to the States, nor the distributor who picked it up, nor the sales rep who brought it to the restaurant's wine buyer, nor the wine buyer for putting it on the list.

The wine sold as well as it did because the servers liked it, thought it was a great deal for such a well-made wine, and emphasized it to their guests. The people largely responsible for his success were the very people he had slighted. The servers, thereafter, boycotted his wine and the winemaker saw a dramatic dip in his sales. Had he never left Italy to investigate, this might never have happened.

The moral of the story is: Better to let sleeping dogs lie.



Oh, no wait.... it's LEARN TO TIP, PAISAN!

The Week in Wankers

There was this couple griping in German about the hostess; their server happened to speak and understand German. She held her tongue until they'd ordered, received their meal and were halfway through it, then asked - in perfect German - if it was good.

Ah, sweet Demütigung!

A nice old lady asked me for a bottle of "the Tuscan Chardonnay", a roasted chestnutty little thing by Felsina, one of the most respected producers in Tuscany. Then she asked me "Is it DRYYYYY?" (See Catastrophic Post-Modernist Nightmare) I asked her what she usually likes to drink. She said, "I hate to admit it, but Yellowtail."
"Trust me. You'll love this. It's infinitely more interesting, layered and subtle than that butterball."
"Fine," she said. "And could you bring a glass of ice with it?"

Later, her trashy little granddaughter showed up, in fake tan and stiletto boots, all of 21, 22. She loudly proclaimed to her grandmother that she ought to try one of her mussels. The grandmother said, "What are they like?"
"They're just like oysters," the girl replied loudly, obviously pleased with herself. "They taste like slimy fish."
Wrong three different ways in one breath. Most impressive.

A late table came in, about five minutes before closing. She was already drunk. He was enabling. She announced, with a boredom that still managed to sound zealous, that she used to run a wine bar. Then she slurred, "I don't like sweet. Nothing sweet."
(See For the Love of GAWD, people, stop saying you hate sweet wine cause you don't and you shouldn't anyway but it doesn't matter cause you DON'T...)
I described a Salice Salentino to her as a lush and juicy blueberry with peppery wood tannins and nice acidity to balance the fruit, and she said "Hellloo? I told you I don't like 'sweet'."
It took me a second to realize she meant the reference to blueberries.
"It's not a Jolly Rancher," I said. "But it is made from fruit, so..."

Ran a wine bar, my ass. More like ran BY a wine bar.
Once.
In Borneo.

"What does brown butter ice cream taste like?"
"And the creme fraiche?"

My favorite exchange of the week, though, was courtesy of my coworker, C___, whose deadpan deliveries are the kind of genetic superpower I might have had if I weren't conceived on hallucinogens.
After scanning the very short dessert menu for some time, a lady looked up at C____ and said,
"I like chocolate ice cream, what do you suggest?"
"Amy's," he answered, referring to our local ice cream chain.

Guess you had to be there.

The catastrophic postmodernist nightmare that is the discussion of the wine list

When was the last time communication was so bad between you and another person that it made your face actually come off, walk outside, and have a cigarette without you?

For me, it happens almost nightly.
Come on, how bad can it be?
Try this exchange, which really for super-cereal real happened, about a week ago (for the purposes of added insight, the female guest shall be known as Shiraz-Seeker):

Shiraz-Seeker: (perusing list with a distinct look of utter confusion because it has no Shiraz on it) I want a red wine but I don't like a real dry wine.

Me: When you say "dry", do you mean you don't want something that feels very tannic?

Shiraz-Seeker: No, I don't mind tannins....

Me: You just want there to be a lot of body and fruit with it.

Shiraz-Seeker: Well I don't want anything sweet.

Me: It wouldn't be sweet. We're just talking fruit - and it's kind of lush. It's a Priorat we have that's got a nice full mouth of red fruit and some pepper...

Shiraz-Seeker: Pepper? So is it real dry?

Me: (face detaching itself and walking outside while flipping the bird) Who knows.

I highlighted the words: dry, sweet, tannins, lush, body, fruit, because these are words most often bandied about in wine reviews and discussion. They, and several other extrinsically worthless words like "mid-palate" and "finish" make up what the mass populace thinks of as the Impenetrable Lexicon of Wine. These words will do nothing to help you understand wine if you don't already have some inkling of it - if you haven't thought about the way it feels and smells and tastes. The words only give some semblance of structure to this otherwise catastrophic postmodernist nightmare that is the discussion of the wine list.

In other words: don't use borrowed words to to shop for anything. It's like when you try to parrot your knowledgeable brother-in-law when you are at your mechanic's so they will think you know what you are talking about and should, therefore, NOT be swindled out of a lot of money. I've been horribly guilty of this very thing. ("It's better to keep your mouth shut and have people think you a fool than to open it and remove all doubt." -- somebody smarter than I)

"Dry" to one person means a lot of tannins, which give your mouth the feeling of being pulled on or filled with tiny strands of wood. Think black tea.
"Dry" to someone else might mean a high alcohol content.
"Dry" to yet another person might mean, in white wine, a high natural acidity, which actually makes your mouth water, so is it dry or just wet-waiting-to-happen?

So next time you are at one of my tables, lost in the wilderness of names and varietals and vintages and regions, don't use these words. Just tell me some wines you usually like to drink that we don't have - or better yet, what you plan to eat - and then let me go from there. You describing what you want will yield no better results than if I just hurled glasses of different selections at you and let you choose by licking them off your shirt.

The task must be made difficult, for only the difficult inspires the noble-hearted.
-- Kierkegaard

Oh, and here:

Sweet wine won't hurt you

I throw up in my mouth whenever someone orders a chocolate dessert with candied orange peels and ginger crystals and then says "I'll have another merlot." That's the gustatory equivalent of going to the Metropolitan Opera with your ipod on. There's a reason the wine list has dessert wines on it. If they DO order a dessert wine, most people go right for the Port (because that's all they know), though it may not be the best pairing. For a transcendessimal experience, try some of the following next time you go out:

Vin Santo de Chianti - a roasted-chestnutty angel in a glass with the kind of exciting hot syrup texture you remember from sneaking your grandma's apricot brandy by the fire. Works especially well with desserts featuring cheese, nuts, stone fruits, pineapple.

Moscato d'Asti - can be "ish", as most things produced in great quantity are, but in the right hands, it is a fresh and lively red apple number sparkling away on your tongue with black pepper notes. Very versatile - try with sorbets and panna cottas, vanillas, berries, custards and rich desserts. The acidity and bubbles will help reign in all that cloy.

Sauternes, or any botrycized equivalent thereof - Botrytis is a fungus that, in optimum conditions, shrivels the grape and concentrates all its sugars for some sweet-ass, complex wine. Look also for: Trockenbeerenauslese (Riesling), Lupiac (Sauv Blanc and Semillon, like Sauternes), Selecion de Grand Noble (Alsace). In a year where the crop sees noble rot (the desirable form of Botrytis), Chile's unbeatable Errazuriz (comprised of Sauv Blanc, Sauv Gris, and Viognier) makes a nice alternative to the pricier Bordeaulaises of Sauternes and Lupiac. The slight bit of funk from the rotted grapes is heaven with a foie gras, cheese and nuts, pears. Incidentally, the most expensive wines in the world include Chateau Y'Quiem, a Sauternes producer. Not that price is always a good indication of the ethereal, but in this case, the aristocracy is onto something.

Reccioto del Valpolicella - Not to be confused with Valpolicella, which is a dry wine. In Reccioto, they leave the Valpolicella grapes (usually the doo-wop trio Rondinella, Corvina and Molinara) on the vine to get all sugary, then lay them out on mats to dry. If you are having chocolate and want to try a red other than Port, get on this. It's similar to Port in its raisiny, dried fig thing, but it's not fortified with additional alcohol. Instead, it gets its braces from a natural acidity, which is like warming yourself on a cold winter's night by the fire, not on it.

Let go of high school and drink this motherfucking rosé

Is it sweet?

She wrinkles her face. Her whole face. Like she’s really asking if it came out of a dog’s asshole. Is it sweeeet? The last word drawn out like a flat note on a horn, or a fart.

The wine being unduly subject to this girl’s ignorance, is Bellefon Salmon, a lovely pink Champagne. From, you know, Champagne. In France. Most people still refer to anything bubbling in their glass as Champagne, even if it didn’t come from anywhere near Champagne.

Since the Treaty of Madrid in 1891, wines could only be legally labeled "Champagne" if they came from there, and this was globally reaffirmed after WWI in the Treaty of Versailles. But because the U.S. Senate never ratified the Treaty (Wilson signed it, though), it claims it doesn't have to abide by these laws. To prevent a global tussle, the U.S. allowed that only certain California producers making sparkling wine before 2006 could label their wines "California Champagne."

America, fuck yeah.


Despite wanting to shoot her into outer space, I smile at the clueless girl and say, No, Darlin, it’s not sweet in the slightest.

Darlin is what I call people when my head has named them worse things. Sweetie, Honey, Sugar. If you hear me say it, it means I think you’re scum. The kind of reprehensible beast I blame for global warming, Robert Parker, ugly fashion trends and most of the music that came out of the 90s. Your inability to learn or think makes you an obedient drone of marketing execs and feeds their endless lust for kinky sex with the filthiest whores they can scrape up on craigslist.

No, Darlin, that Shiraz that I overheard you screeching about earlier with the big “94” printed on the tag is sweeter than this rosé.

She frowns and lets me pour her a taste. She sips it like it’s hemlock and I know what she’s going to say and I brace myself but it shreds me up anyway, makes all the blood run to my forearms, my hands, ready to throttle her to death.

Wow! That’s not sweet at all!

What she is thinking of is that Freshman Rape In A Bottle, Arbor Mist. Boone’s Farm's Strawberry Hill. This stuff is no more wine than I’m a ferret. It’s carbonated sugar – Fanta with 7.5% alcohol. The only thing it has in common with Champagne’s beautiful, strawberry and pebble-kissed dry dry Bellefon Salmon, is the color. And even that isn't similar enough to warrant suspicion. Rosés vary wildly in hue, from deep neon red to palest peach. The color comes from the brief contact the juice has with its red grape skins, and the longer the contact, the more tannins you can usually expect. A fleshy, savory fresh blood-colored ciliegiolo from Liguria can feel bigger in the mouth than a wispy, refreshing Provencal salmon number, but both find their flavors in the red berry spectrum: strawberries, raspberries and cherries. In better rosés, the mineral aspects give it structure - a sparkling brininess at the finish maybe, a chalky, pebbly weight as you drink. This is what keeps it from being just silly, stupid fruit drink.

If a server or bartender suggests “rosé” and you think they are talking about Arbor Mist, you have your head in your ass, which is right where the good folks at Fox News want it. No one – and let me repeat this with the greatest emphasis – no one in the wine or food industry will ever refer to Arbor Mist as a rosé. If they do, stand up and walk out right away. This is a kitchen that intentionally puts cockroaches in their food. They have rabies and sleep under a bridge and wipe their asses with their hands. They alternate which one, so you can't avoid it when you shake.

And heaven help you if you ask me if this is "blush."