I recently followed WS recommendations of a couple of CA restaurants while visiting in that state. These were A.O.C. in LA and Wine Cask in Santa Barbara. Food at AOC was great-all it was hyped to be. Wine Cask will never get a return visit from my spouse and me. Food was mediocre and first order of fish was "fishy".
This is about wine, however. In both of these highly touted for their wine lists, we encountered the same problem. It is common throughout "white table service" restaurants but is particularly onerous when encountered in WS recommendations, which should accord wine the proper respect. I'm speaking of the "jelly glasses" and "one size fits all" glasses which really nice restaurants are using to serve their guests who order by the glass. In this day of strict law enforcement, many of us are extremely wary of drinking more than one or two glasses of wine at dinner and we order by the glass. Many fine restaurants, these two included, offer a wonderful selection of great wines by the glass. They then proceed to serve them in a jelly glass! When questioned, the somelier or waiter's response is "that's our standard glass for red wines by the glass". Ridiculous. I pay $20 for a glass of Cab and they serve it in a $2.00 "restaurant quality" glass.
At AOC, the somelier was gracious enough to go and get appropriate glasses for our table after we complained (twice!) but at Wine Cask, no such luck. I have to say that at the wine bar at the Wine Cask, which we visited several hours earlier, appropriate glassware is used.
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