Their ranks are few
– most are confined to large cities like New York and San
Francisco – and their craft shrouded in obscurity, but sommeliers
are much more than the term
”
wine steward
”
implies.
Their ranks are few – most are confined to large cities like New York and San Francisco – and their craft shrouded in obscurity, but sommeliers are much more than the term “wine steward” implies.
Highly educated industry professionals, they not only make recommendations from the wine list, but create the list itself, advise restaurant owners, surprise, delight and act as taste interpreters.
Gilroy’s Old City Hall is one of the few non-urban restaurants to employ a sommelier, but the merit of such a choice is readily apparent when inspecting their plentiful wine list.
“You have to select the wine based mostly on location and the type of food you’re serving in a restaurant,” said Alexandre Andrieux, who holds a diploma of sommelier from France’s prestigious University du Vin at the Chateau De Suze-La Rousse. “If you’re in Napa Valley you’re going to serve mostly Napa wines. If you’re in a German restaurant you’re going to serve different wines than if you were in a French restaurant.”
Developing a sensitive enough palette to judge wines for inclusion in a restaurant list takes time and skill. Andrieux, originally from Aix-en-Provence in southern France, completed his training in a small French village.
He completed a course that included daily morning tastings, all of which had to be fully documented in page-long reports, and intensive training on the production of wine as well as its taste.
His exit exams were stringent. Only about 20 people pass each year.
The closest thing to such rigorous development is the $3,100 diploma of sommelier offered by the International Sommelier Guild, which has 30 locations across the United States and Canada.
The course requires 189 class hours, with three hours of outside study encouraged for each hour spent in lectures.
Tasting and direct teacher-student contact are emphasized, in part because taste is otherwise so objective.
“Sensory evaluation is so individual,” said Jennifer Janssen, director of marketing and communication for the association.
“A lot of courses allow home tasting, but you don’t benefit without that direct connection. You need someone there to help connect the dots.”
The class culminates with a two-day, 13-hour test comprised of five components. Examinees must pass all five sections, including a blind taste test and an essay section, if they wish to receive their diploma.
“If they’ve got experience in the industry, especially in the front of the restaurant, working with people, the pay raise (for this job) could be substantial,” said Janssen. “If the sommelier is just starting out and really building up their experience for the first time, they could actually be taking a pay cut if they’re an attorney.”
Consultations with Andrieux can range anywhere from $3,000 to $8,000 for work that entails less than 40 hours per week, but he collaborates closely with chefs to create wine lists that reflect the location, atmosphere, taste and feel of a restaurant.
At Old City Hall he’s concocted a mix of local samplings along with more renown specimens to please each customer.
“Some customers will say, ‘I want this type of wine,’ but they don’t have much vocabulary to really describe the kind they want, so part of the job is to research what they’re looking for,” said Andrieux.
“Others know a great deal about wine and will know exactly what they want. A good sommelier will find something you’ve never heard of before, and what’s interesting is getting an educated customer to try something new that you’ve selected.”
The International Sommelier Guild’s nearest class meets in Los Angeles. New sessions convene Feb. 5 with instructor Mark Davidson. For more information visit www.InternationalSommelier.com. Old City Hall is open daily from 5pm to 11pm. For reservations, call (408) 846-8880.
