Asimov: Somms going the way of the dodo?

I don’t eat out that often.
When I do/did, I always enjoyed learning. In most instances, a somm could teach me something.
And of course, there’s good ones and bad ones; I could usually tell early on and set my own course, if needed.

That said, a trip to Bern’s or wherever Pascaline is working, would be terribly diminished without the somm in house. That, I would miss a lot.
 
Good discussion on the other bored, too. It doesn't matter to me. I'm generally bringing my own wine. If the corkage is egregiously high, I'll generally figure out something on my own. It may be cocktails if I feel the wine list is too pricey for its own good (that is, I feel markup is too high). If it's a list that's mostly natural wine, I'll ask for advice, but tell the somm/waitperson my parameters.
 
Ebbs and flows. Apparently, in Roman times, the sommelier (equivalent) was responsible for doctoring the wine to cover its flaws AND was assigned to serve and sleep with specific high-status dinner guests.

The position has evolved since then, and will likely continue to evolve. But fermented grape juice and their specialists will be with us forever!
 
As a restaurant owner it's very difficult to justify the expense, especially for a stand alone independent restaurant like ours. An employee who is just a sommelier doesn't really work in our context and I would think you have to be substantially busier than most places are to justify it. What really works is a front of the house manager that is also a sommelier but that's been hard to find.

I enjoy interacting with sommeliers most of the time.
 
Had no use for them in Scandinavia, where the half a dozen I “dialogued” with (and everyone else in the wine business I encountered) were neither sensitive to nor trained to detect VA.
 
originally posted by Rahsaan:
Ebbs and flows. Apparently, in Roman times, the sommelier (equivalent) was responsible for doctoring the wine to cover its flaws AND was assigned to serve and sleep with specific high-status dinner guests.

The position has evolved since then, and will likely continue to evolve. But fermented grape juice and their specialists will be with us forever!
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One expects it could evolve back into what it once was. There is ample flawed wine to doctor and sex will never go out of style. The role of sommelier is a pendulum that swings back and forth every few thousand years.
 
originally posted by MLipton:
Asimov: Somms going the way of the dodo?In today’s NYT, Eric Asimov weighs in on the decline of the sommelier position in restaurants. Has anyone noted such a trend where they are and, if so, does it matter to you?

Mark Lipton
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As someone who eats out several times per week I can say there are definitely less somms. And the days of guys like Levi on the floor are over. However it mostly does not matter to me because of the restaurants I choose to visit. The restaurants that I frequent most have great wine lists and every person on the floor knows the list. The Four Horsemen is the best example. Justin Chearno is the wine director but he does not work on the floor and allows everyone at the restaurant to have some level of input on the large list. Every FOH person there knows the list and has his or her favorite wines or sections and it works really well. Other places that have similar models are Claud and GEM to name just a couple. The somms on the floors at the bigger restaurants I sometimes frequent for business meals are pretty green simply because so many have left the industry.

Speaking of Levi I think of his skin contact / orange wine dinners every single time I go out and see that every restaurant in NYC and other major cities have an extensive orange wine section.
 
It's a really poor article on a number of levels, it is clear that Asimov doesn't have the depth of knowledge to write the piece in an accurate way. It would also appear that there is no real editorial process for his pieces. There doesn't seem to be anyone within the process at the "Times" who might ask, "but wait, has this paragraph got it right? Is this accurate?" Asimov is just writing whatever at this point in his career, and whatever he writes is frequently inaccurate.

Just to quickly puncture some of the assertions made, consider the recent work of Victoria James, Jhonel Faelnar, and what Annie Shi has put into place for King and Jupiter. This idea that there are no ascendant American sommeliers of the moment is ludicrous on its face. I would note here, however, that none of those people is a white male. Perhaps some blinders are on to what the situation actually is. It is also clear that Asimov has too close of a relationship to Jason Wise, and that he ascribes too much relevance to the SOMM films. Ignoring the impact of something like "Secrets of the Sommeliers" by Raj Parr and Jordan Mackay on people's desire to be a sommelier, or indeed my own numerous interviews with sommeliers over a decade, that's just erasure. Long before the SOMM films, I had a blog titled "So You Want to Be A Sommelier?" I called it that because so many people would tell me that they wished they had my job. Asimov's grasp of the history of American sommeliers is shaky at best.

It would be helpful for everybody if Asimov retired at this point. His best work is behind him. His career project has been to call into question other sources of authority in the wine world, and he has been moderately successful at knocking them down. This sommelier article is just the latest installment of that project. But, tellingly, Asimov hasn't built much to take the place of what he tries to knock over.
 
I still see sommeliers on the floor when I go to serious restaurants in big cities, and they tend to be intent on being hospitable and informative and not being condescending jerks.

For the most part, I like Asimov's writing, but I make the distinction of him being a wine writer and not a wine critic. He's an evangelist (I'm hesitant to use the term "advocate" due to the potentially prejudicial oeno-commercial context of the word) for what he believes in, and I like that. I also like that he's an excellent reporter. I do think that he's not as good at stories regarding the business of wine (Esther Mobley and Jess Lander of the SF Chronicle are brilliant in that category).

The "Somms are DedDedDed" (or whatever) idea is WrongWrongWrong, but whomever is editing Asimov (and it being the NY Times, there IS someone editing him) is probably editing in the food section who's transferred over from Sports or Real Estate and might not know enough about wine to be able to ask Eric what the hell he was trying to say, and couldn't he say it better?

originally posted by Levi Dalton:
But, tellingly, Asimov hasn't built much to take the place of what he tries to knock over.
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This is a really interesting thought. There are some really good journalists who've moved the wine world forward (Levi, Elaine Brown, Raj & Jordan) through education and interviews, but which wine writers (not wine critics) have built much of substance, adding value to the way we think/talk/drink about wine? Tim Atkin is building something with words, I think Matt Kramer was ahead of his time, and the Aussie newsletter The Week That Was is fucking awe-inspiring in its ability to call bullshit on the industry while also coming up with solutions. Anyone else inspiring out there? I like Jason Wilson a lot, and if his wine writing never reaches the peaks of world-changing concepts, at least he's got some excellent cocktail recipes.

-Eden (and the SOMM movies here on the west coast are still the main way that people have heard about this career option. Maybe it's because I'm close to Los Olivos (scene of the crime) but people still wanna talk about the film)
 
originally posted by Eden Mylunsch:


This is a really interesting thought. There are some really good journalists who've moved the wine world forward (Levi, Elaine Brown, Raj & Jordan) through education and interviews, but which wine writers (not wine critics) have built much of substance, adding value to the way we think/talk/drink about wine? Tim Atkin is building something with words, I think Matt Kramer was ahead of his time, and the Aussie newsletter The Week That Was is fucking awe-inspiring in its ability to call bullshit on the industry while also coming up with solutions. Anyone else inspiring out there? I like Jason Wilson a lot, and if his wine writing never reaches the peaks of world-changing concepts, at least he's got some excellent cocktail recipes.
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I actually like William Kelley more as a wine writer than as a wine critic. His long article about Bordeaux was well-researched and informative.

I kind of wish he would spend more time doing that than doling out points -- but I get that the industry prestige and influence comes from the tasting notes (I guess actual journalism is tl;dr)
 
I would suggest that the occupants of this place and others have expended more energy and effort into learning about wine than many diners, even those at very high end restaurants.

Therefore, the knowledge criteria "bar" is higher because the knowledge distribution curve has shifted. Therefore, many Sommeliers and even critics won't rate (for us) because we already know what we like (right, wrong or in the middle) and those who might offer advice are less likely to offer meaningful advice to us.

Of course, there are exceptions, I'm sure Levi could teach me a lot of things about Italian wine, as an example, and Pascaline could do the same with French wine - and I'd be very interested to learn from both of them. But imho, the "average" restaurant wine person and most critics, for that matter, are not helpful to me because I already know I don't like certain things and I very much like other things. So BYOB is nearly always my choice.
 
originally posted by Yule Kim:


I actually like William Kelley more as a wine writer than as a wine critic. His long article about Bordeaux was well-researched and informative.
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He often enters into conversations (or starts them) on the Berzerker’s board and I make it a point to read them. Not all are fascinating but he knows a great deal and I like to learn. And on occasion, I have followed his advice with excellent results.
Callahan had/has a lot of knowledge and while he can be abrupt, he teaches (when he was/is around).
Levi is also full of info, some quite current, although he too can be abrupt.
Although Asimov is a little too pedestrian in his writing for me, I applaud his attempts; for those not as jaded, he is readable and helpful.
There are a few more names I could add, some who even stalk these halls, but these should suffice.

Truth is, I don’t much care about personalities, I just like learning about wine.
 
Sommeliers I trust may be very helpful to me when I go to a restaurant with a long wine list I'm not familiar with. I don't like poring over a long list. He can/will steer me to a good value I might like which is buried in the long list.

. . . . . . Pete
 
originally posted by Eden Mylunsch:
I still see sommeliers on the floor when I go to serious restaurants in big cities, and they tend to be intent on being hospitable and informative and not being condescending jerks.

For the most part, I like Asimov's writing, but I make the distinction of him being a wine writer and not a wine critic. He's an evangelist (I'm hesitant to use the term "advocate" due to the potentially prejudicial oeno-commercial context of the word) for what he believes in, and I like that. I also like that he's an excellent reporter. I do think that he's not as good at stories regarding the business of wine (Esther Mobley and Jess Lander of the SF Chronicle are brilliant in that category).

The "Somms are DedDedDed" (or whatever) idea is WrongWrongWrong, but whomever is editing Asimov (and it being the NY Times, there IS someone editing him) is probably editing in the food section who's transferred over from Sports or Real Estate and might not know enough about wine to be able to ask Eric what the hell he was trying to say, and couldn't he say it better?

originally posted by Levi Dalton:
But, tellingly, Asimov hasn't built much to take the place of what he tries to knock over.
Click to expand...

This is a really interesting thought. There are some really good journalists who've moved the wine world forward (Levi, Elaine Brown, Raj & Jordan) through education and interviews, but which wine writers (not wine critics) have built much of substance, adding value to the way we think/talk/drink about wine? Tim Atkin is building something with words, I think Matt Kramer was ahead of his time, and the Aussie newsletter The Week That Was is fucking awe-inspiring in its ability to call bullshit on the industry while also coming up with solutions. Anyone else inspiring out there? I like Jason Wilson a lot, and if his wine writing never reaches the peaks of world-changing concepts, at least he's got some excellent cocktail recipes.

-Eden (and the SOMM movies here on the west coast are still the main way that people have heard about this career option. Maybe it's because I'm close to Los Olivos (scene of the crime) but people still wanna talk about the film)
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andrew jefford and jamie goode immediately come to mind.

and besides being very good wine critics, john livingston and neal martin are great wine writers.
 
To be really specific, so that everyone perhaps starts to understand, Eric Asimov is a plagiarist. This isn't a quibble about his wine writing style. He has specifically taken things that I have said and printed them word for word without a citation. His main stock in trade is more subtle, which is to take a main idea from a yet to be released book that he has seen an advance copy of, and run out ahead of that book release with a piece in the paper on a similar topic. You could call it a Times Book Review type idea, except he isn't great about crediting where a key idea in his piece came from. He does the same by scouring twitter, or at one time, this board. This board used to be a prime source of material for him. Sometimes he'll throw in a shoutout to somebody, as an act of grand generosity. More often he tries to be predatory. He has the biggest platform, so he can get away with erasure and just inventing whatever history might be complimentary to those that hold IOUs over him. Does Asimov have contemporaneous receipts for those expensive La Paulee events he has attended over the years? I'd be curious.

I think it would help the wider community if some amount of critical eye were turned on the man's work. I understand that not everyone closely reads the wine column, but all the bad aspects have been right there in print for a long time. It is amazing he has gotten away with it for so long.
 
originally posted by Levi Dalton:
To be really specific, so that everyone perhaps starts to understand, Eric Asimov is a plagiarist. This isn't a quibble about his wine writing style. He has specifically taken things that I have said and printed them word for word without a citation.
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Interesting backstory.

I wonder if the same fast-and-loose philosophy applies to Pete Wells? I've long been suspicious of the way he writes so knowingly about aspects of global cuisine that are truly obscure by any standard. I always figured that either he was a true scholar, or it was just the Expert Tone that he was expected to adopt, even if I might prefer more frankness about his learning process. But you raise other possibilities!
 
originally posted by Rahsaan:

I wonder if the same fast-and-loose philosophy applies to Pete Wells?
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This gets into one of the differences between a writer and a critic. A good critic will have an idea of what the restaurant is trying to do and in the course of the review educate their readers about the expectations as much as inform them of the quality of the particular place. They'll have done a lot of research about what the food is based on and thus be able to lend an opinion on what the joint is doing right (or doing wrong, as the case may be).

Another factor is that restaurant critics do not "taste blind." They know where they're dining and they know what they're eating. So doing their homework beforehand is important, as if following up with the chef after the bulk of the review has been written to confirm ingredients, cooking techniques, etc... Wine critics tend to be looked at askance when they're not doing their critiques blind. Go figure, different standards for the two disciplines.

I like Pete Wells' writing -- I learn from his reviews and am entertained by them. There's not a lot of room for a sense of humor to emerge in wine reviews (although Philip White prevails against my blunt generalization) and Wells manages to get some funny stuff in, but not usually like the really snarky British restaurant critics such as Jay Rayner or AA Gill (although Pete's takedowns of Per Se and Guy Fieri's Grill are legendary in the category and offer cringeworthy reading).

Having spent time around a number of high level restaurant critics, they're served a lot of pretty mediocre food in highly desirable restaurants and have to make sense of what it is, vs what it should be vs what their flacks say it is. They need to have some benchmarks in place when they eat so they can put out an honest review. They're looking for good things to say about a place, and good critics are honest with their readers and let them know how great the gulf between "good intentions" and "worth spending the money" is.

Wine critics face similar parameters, but they can fall back on "I review what's in the glass" and not worry about the winemaker's intentions. Except when it's a legendary producer or unicorn vineyard or from a great vintage or a wine from a major advertiser, and at that point maybe the review gets skewed a little bit this way or that way to bring the planets into alignment.

-Eden (it always fascinates me to notice the moment that someone makes the critic at the table. The schlumpy server vanishes and is replaced by the maitre'd and the manager, the portions all of a sudden get bigger and are plated perfectly, and seven desserts are sent over even though you only ordered four. The night's gone to hell for the critic because this is NOT the experience their reader will have when they patronize the place. Not that something like this would ever happen when wineries submit their wines to critics for review! No way!!)
 
re: aa gill--nobody on the face of the written english earth could out snark him. it was a tool he used with rapier effectiveness--when called for. his take on wheatgrass, when drinking that was all the rage... it tasted like the cud of a sheep with gingivitis.

but even so much more, a brilliant observer. read the book "aa gill is away" if you need to. or "the angry island" or "to america with love".
 
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