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Jay Rayner slams the ‘bollocks spouted by wine connoisseurs’
Restaurant critic Jay Rayner has slammed the “bollocks spouted by wine connoisseurs,” suggesting diners should ignore them and buy “the cheapest wine on the list”.
The knives are out – Jay Rayner has laid into ‘intimidating’ wine connoisseurs
As reported by the Daily Mail, loose-tongued Rayner laid into “intimidating” wine lists and snobby sommeliers during a recent talk at Cheltenham Literary Festival.
“I was in City Social and the wine list was stratospheric. I asked the waiter if he could find me a bottle of Pinot Noir for under £50.
“He looked at me as if I was some kind of scum on his heel and said he couldn’t, so I called him back and said there’s one for £49, you didn’t even know your own wine list,” he said.
“Wine lists are fraught with problems, mostly because of the bollocks spouted by wine connoisseurs. They irritate me profoundly.
“I do not hold to being intimidated by anything in life and if a wine list irritates you just buy the cheapest on the list and tell them all to piss off,” he added.
The 50-year-old Observer critic also advised attendees to the festival to “drink the house wine in a restaurant and the expensive wine at home”.
Restaurant mark-ups are a grey area with no official guidelines. The November issue of the drinks business will explore the topic in depth.
I agree with Jay, mark ups are far too much of a grey area and never ending lists are so off putting. Wouldn’t it make more sense for sommeliers to spend time on presenting wine lists that assist the diner in choosing wine, rather than forcing them to ask for advice? Punters will buy the cheapest if they don’t know why they should spend more.
If he was not an idiot he would be able to navigate a sophisticated wine list.
(Based solely upon what is reported above) Mr. Rayner is simultaneously spouting the same bollocks of which he accuses wine “connoisseurs” of doing, and is correct. I dislike the use of the word “connoisseur,” as there is no true definition: is a connoisseur simply “a person who knows a lot about something (such as art, wine, food, etc.) : an expert in a particular subject,” as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary? There is nothing wrong with knowing a good deal on a particular subject; I presume Mr. Rayner, whom I have not met, knows a good deal about restaurants and food, otherwise he is shockingly employed in the wrong field. Is Mr. Rayner perhaps referring to “wine snobs,” as opposed to those who truly know a good deal about wine? Now, he is quite right that — in many, probably most, cases, the markups in restaurants is indeed outrageous. Then again, the markups on “house wine” are often worse — a wine that costs the restaurant 50¢/£0.60 per glass may be on the list for $5/£6 or more! In contrast, that bottle that cost the restaurant $33/£28 may be as much as $100-150 / £90-120 on the list; higher price, but a lower percentage markup (albeit still outrageous!).
That said, as Mr. Rayner suggests, I never exceed my budget when purchasing wine(s0 off the list, and I save the “expensive wine” for home . . . but then again, unlike most wine drinkers today, I have a decent-sized cellar at home of some 50 cases. Few wine drinkers nowadays have that luxury.
People that complain about wine costs and blithely drink a martini that’s marked up 5-6 times annoy me. If you want to drink cheap wine, drink it. If you want amazing wine in a crystal glass that served correctly and at the right temperature you’re going to have to pay for it. If you find a snotty Somm, immediately ask for the manager and tell her or him that the attitude is the reason your leaving right now and wont be back. Go someplace that has a great Somm and spend your money there and also share the positive critique with the manager. I’m from the generation that learned from MS like Evan Goldstein, Josh Wesson and Madeline Triffon and all of these great leaders resent Somms that act the way the one mentioned above does.