For anyone who cares about wine, buying it in a restaurant can be thrilling, fraught with missteps or somewhere in between. In Los Angeles, we’re lucky enough to have world-class wine service at such restaurants as Spago and Cut, Republique, Osteria Mozza and many others. But not every restaurant has caught up with the basics of wine service. How hard can it be to open a bottle and pour a glass? You’d be surprised. Here are some of my pet peeves. Want to tell me some of yours?
The heavy pour
It happens all the time. The server pours wine in my glass practically all the way to the top. The pour should be at most three fingers high, leaving plenty of room for the wine’s bouquet — and for swirling. The trick is to catch the waiter beforehand and show how high you’d like the pour. But what do you do about the waiter intent on pouring out the entire bottle even before he gets to the last person at the table? Or the one who empties out the bottle to whoever drinks the fastest? You may have to risk the contempt of the server and ask to take charge of the bottle yourself.
By the numbers
Is it too much to expect the servers at a restaurant that has a sophisticated, wide-ranging wine list to at least recognize the names of the wines? When I spend time poring over the list and deciding on a wine, it’s discouraging to get the response, “What number is that?” Even top restaurants are not immune. Anybody who works in a serious restaurant should be curious — even passionate — enough about food and wine to make the extra effort to learn about the wines. Or at least to recognize the name on a bottle without resort to calling it by its number. In an ideal world, waiters would be more friendly with the wines, stoked to have a customer ferret out an obscure bottle or favorite label.
Missing or wrong vintage
Some restaurants don’t even bother to indicate the vintage for white wines. The reason quoted? Everybody knows it’s the current vintage. But not every white is as fresh and quaffable as a Vinho Verde. Some whites are better with a year or two of age. Without the vintage indicated, you’d have no idea that the restaurant is pouring last year’s Arneis or a tired Orvieto. And what if you order a bottle of Burgundy from a great vintage and the server brings out the newer, lesser vintage without even noting the fact. You’re paying a premium; they should get it right.
Wrong temperature
A good half of the time when you order a red wine, unless it comes from a temperature-controlled wine room, the bottle is too warm. If the bottle doesn’t feel slightly cool to the touch, it needs a chill to show its best. Savvy wine waiters know this. But sometimes when you ask for a wine bucket, it elicits a raised eyebrow. And the wine bucket may show up with only a few ice cubes at the bottom, no water. (The iced water needs to come at least halfway up the bottle.) White wines that are too cold are less of a problem because the bottle will inevitably warm up. You can also speed things along by holding the bowl of the wine glass in your hands.
Only heavy hitters
It’s fantastic to see a big collection of important Cabernets and Pinot Noirs, Burgundies and Barolos on a wine list, but when those heavy hitters make up practically the whole list, the wine lover who doesn’t want to spend the equivalent of a car payment on a bottle of wine is left bereft. C’mon, how about giving a little love to the wines under $100? It’s not a question of scarcity: This is the best time ever to be drinking wine, and there are plenty of wonderful and intriguing wines from vineyards in near and far-flung regions around the world that can come in under $60 on a wine list — and easily hold their own against those heavy hitters.
Whisking away your glass
It happens all the time. Suddenly you reach out to take that last sip you’ve been saving, and your wine glass is gone. Seeing just a splash of wine left in the glass, the waiter has whisked your glass away in some confused idea of good service. Know this: Wine lovers like to linger over their glasses, noting how the bouquet changes, or savoring that very last sip. Some of us prefer to keep all our wines on the table, even that flute of Champagne we didn’t quite finish. It might turn out to be a revelation with the scallop dish or the dessert, who knows? We like all our options close at hand. With great wine, sometimes the last drop is the best.
The missing bottle
You open the wine list. You spend time poring over the categories, sussing out the bottles in your price range that might be interesting — and affordable. You order the wine. The server disappears for 20 minutes, only to come back and tell you he or she can’t find the wine. That can happen. But then you go back to the list, order another wine. Many minutes later, your server is back with more bad news: They don’t have that one either. Why, when wine lists can be easily updated on the computer, isn’t this one current? If one wine can’t be found, not a problem. But when the second wine isn’t in stock either, or the third, what’s going on? Is this the case of a wine list padded with nonexistent wines, the better to qualify for a Wine Spectator award?
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