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Originally posted by VinesGirl:

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Originally posted by Sandy Fitzgerald:
First, on temperature. Restaurants make decisions on wine storage conditions. Some put in proper temp. control,others do not. It's a financial decision. The wait staff has no control over the temp of the wine, it is what it is.

Except for the very upscale restaurants, finding and keeping wait staff is an on-going battle. Most people seeking that employment in the marketplace, don't know the difference between a Screaming Eagle and a Mad Dog. Many show little motivation to learn.

Both locally and nationally, as I travel, it seems more and more restaurants below to the same tired franchise. The name of the franchise is : Flip that Table. I know of one hot new restuarant locally that pays it waiters bonuses based on the number of tables they flip in 50 minutes or less. Serving wine gets in the way of flipping tables. Menu prices for food or wine seems not to be an issue in this mentality. It(table flipping) like wine temp control is just a policy issue of the management. Plus for the patron, why would you want to order a great red, that needs time to open up at the table, when the restaurant's main goal is getting you out the door long before that can happen? I guess I should add that in CO, byob is against the law. But it's not only an issue here. When drinking reds, I feel forced to drink easy and cheap wines at most restaurants.

I beg to differ! The restaurant I work for has 585 selections on our wine list, We unfortunately do not have enough space to cellar temp control the entire list, so some bottles are manually temperature adjusted. The red wines in question are placed in ice bath for 3-4 minutes prior to service. Some of our whites are also stored in a refridgeration unit that is too cold, servers are instructed to pull the wine first, reset with proper glasses, then pour with out putting the wine in to the table chiller for a few minutes. So servers do have control of temperature...not storage, but definitely temperature

Can you tell me the name of your establishment so I make sure to never go there?

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I beg to differ! The restaurant I work for has 585 selections on our wine list, We unfortunately do not have enough space to cellar temp control the entire list, so some bottles are manually temperature adjusted. The red wines in question are placed in ice bath for 3-4 minutes prior to service. Some of our whites are also stored in a refridgeration unit that is too cold, servers are instructed to pull the wine first, reset with proper glasses, then pour with out putting the wine in to the table chiller for a few minutes. So servers do have control of temperature...not storage, but definitely temperature

No matter how you say it. Wines are stred either too warm, too cold, no humidity control.

3-4 minutes in a cold bath will not bring temperature from 75 - 80 degress down to 65 degrees. Maybe the surface of the bottle but not the wine.

Heating the over too cold wine also is a bad way to treat the product.

PS: I think I'll also avoid your establishment.

FWIW, it cost us approximately $7,500 to buy a refrigeration unit that holds 2,600 bottles. We spent another $3,000 to buy 5-50 bottle units behind the bar to hold the BTG bottles.

For $10k, you can get refrigeration for all your bottles.

Why build a list with 585 selections and incur the cost to buy them if you don't want to add the small, marginal cost to store them?

I am often amazed at the number of restaurants that would never consider serving a patron a galss of water at 80-85 degrees, even in winter, but never have second thoughts about serving wine at that temperature!

fact: Heat rises. How often have you gone in an establishment and looked up at a wine racks going floor to ceiling at room temperature. If it's 75 degrees at floor temp, what do they believe the temp of those bottles near the ceiling is? Da! Answer: Guess I'll drink beer today.

I'd like to make a couple of points, the first being that this survey wasn't scientific and therefore the data isn't reliable because it could easily be skewed (for example, the respondents were 80% male...do women not frequent restaurants?!)

Second, I find the market segmentation interesting. The people spending $100+ on a bottle of wine were "more hospitable" to somms, wanted more choices on the wine list, and also thought the wine list was very important when they select a restaurant. Isn't this the target audience of sommeliers? Why wasn't there more focus on this group? Not to sound condescending, but maybe the hostility expressed in this survey and on this board originates from a group of people who have only minimal exposure to sommeliers.

My thoughts on restaurant wine service.

Most restaurants have too many wines. The "kitchen sink" mentality rules, with anything getting a 90 or above from the major critics finding its way on to most lists.

Most wine lists lack any real variety. A selection of 250 different, high scoring Cabernet Sauvignons from Napa is not variety, in my book.

Almost every wine list is essentially the same. Wholesalers have monthly quotas and that is what they focus on, regardless of what kind of restaurant they sell to. It irritates the hell out of me to go to a "French Bistro" and see California wines 10 to 1 over French on the list, and the only French are pedestrian. The same applies to Spanish food restaurants, Italian restaurants and so on.

I find misspellings, incorrect grammar, vintage errors and appellation errors unprofessional, and businesses should make sure these pieces are properly written and pleasing to the eye.

There are far too many wines at the high end of the wine list.

Restaurateurs do not invest the money in training their staffs. First off, turnover averages well over 150% in most restaurants, so the investment in the mind of many owners seems to be money down the drain. Training does not have to be elaborate or highly technical to be effective or to lead to great service.

The internet and Costco have made the prices of wine known to most consumers. Retsuaurants must abandon the 3 - 4 times wholesale markups and price the list intelligently to encourage purchases and deliver the sales and profits needed for the business to thrive. I am not as-a-matter-of-factly implying that this is easy, because it is not. Restaurants are highly taxed, regulated, and squeezed with fees from all sides, so remaining profitable takes vigilance and creativity.