Need info about wine!

[culinart]

Catman,

isnt there a wine course you can take at your community college. I am thinking of taking one this fall, it's once a week and iss less than 400 dollars. You can take it on your day off and the knowledge you get from it will pay off in your job! No one likes a waiter who doesnt know too much about wine and is trying to sway you into buying one of the most expensive bottles in the house, however, if that same bottle was recommended by a waiter who knows "his stuff" (wine language), the customer may be more willing. In the Food and Beverage Industry, especially service, and especially where you work in a fine dining environment or where the business has a impressive selection of international wines, if u dont know your wines...u wont get that much respect from the customers and most likely not much respect from your Manager.
The suggestion of going to your local wine shop and befriending the clerks and other workers there is a great idea. When they are not busy there, they are more than willing to answer all the questions u have regarding wine. Its a boring job stocking the wine shelves, I am sure they would welcome the idea of talking wine with their customer.
I went into my local LCBO , looking for steve body's italian wine and one of the clerks overheard me asking another clerk about it (whom had no idea about the wine i was looking for) and jumped in to offer assistance. We chatted for almost 30 mins, i asked a few questions, learned more than i anticipated and although i didint come out with the wine that i wanted...i got more educated from it. Now can u imagine going there 2-3 times a week getting a wine bottle, along with having several questions to ask, what can come out of it by the weeks end? =)

And I believe restaurants dont invest in staff training is because of the huge profits from their wine inventory. As it was said, some wines are 2.5 times more expensive than the restaurants entree. Great wines demand great food, which in turn brings in customers with great wallets. The restauarant is always going to make huge profits from wine, it is not their responsibility to train staff about wines in general, maybe about the wines they have in stock but if u dont know your basics, then that is the waiters responsibility and they must find a way to educate themselves or pay to learn more about it. They can make very good money, if they cant/wont invest a little of it then why should your manager do the same. It's a 2-way street i believe. In my honest opinion, I think the restaurant should endure 50% of the total cost and hire a wine consultant to teach all their staff members and if a waiter is already educated about wine and wants to upgrade his knowledge, the restaurant should cover 70-80% of total cost. If they stop thinking in greedy terms (restaurants), they will find the investment will pay off , not only with knowledgeable staff but with a staff that stays with you for years upon years! Wow, I sure said alot...sorry for that =D
Good luck catman.

culi

[This message has been edited by culinart (edited 03-18-2003).]