My HomePod alarm goes off at 8:00am. It may sound like a soothing series of deep bells, but it grates my ears. “Hey Siri, snooze.” I consider “Hey Siri, go fuck yourself,” but I stop at the notion that she might respond and I might find myself in a forced conversation with a non-entity. A half an hour later, and after a couple more rude interruptions, I motivate myself to wake up by looking at the news (Is today the day Russia invades?) and with the memory that I have to make my place presentable by 10 am, when my tasting group arrives. I do the dishes and de-clutter the living room, raising the flap on the table next to my couch so we’ll have space to be comfortable. I love flaps. And Murphy beds. And easily moveable furniture. They all remind me of the opening scene of An American in Paris when Gene Kelly wakes up in his tiny but über-functional Paris flat. As he opens the window the music swells and you just expect a robin to land on his shoulder and start a duet with him à la Snow White. Anywho. My friends arrive, each bringing 1-2 concealed bottles, and we taste the following flight:

We taste the Foxen first–flavor like a Rhône Valley Marsanne-Roussanne blend, super nutty, but with way too much acid for that. The taster calls Chablis, I call aged Albariño, and neither of us feels good about it. Then again, the wine is tasty. The girl who brought the wine asked us what other wines are aged on the lees, and I say, “If this is Chenin, then it’s the best Chenin I’ve ever had!” And then my words are quickly force-fed to me when she unwraps the bottle. I’ve just called a California Chenin the best Chenin Blanc I’ve ever had? I’m pretty sure someone is supposed to strip my Advanced pin off my lapel at that point. Moving past that debacle, the second Chenin is very similar: nutty, high-acid, and none of the Botrytis we come to expect after tasting Vouvray after Vouvray. We get this one wrong too, but we’re consoled that at least this tasty wine comes from the prestigious wine village of Brézé in the Loire Valley, so we’re allowed to like it. The third wine was a lesser-known clone of Sangiovese (I called it Nebbiolo, but at least I had Sangiovese in the initial conclusion). It had a pretty nose, but on the palate it was a tannic beast–probably mostly from oak. Huh–I’m pretty sure that this is the first Morellino di Scansano I’ve actually tasted, despite memorizing its existence in my very first wine class at the CIA over a decade ago. Finally we get to my wine, a Marsannay. I’m slightly sour, because it smells wonderful, and I’ve agreed to go sober for a month, so I won’t be enjoying the wine beyond this tasting. Yes, I’ve been diligently spitting this whole time. I should have popped something cheaper, like the Shiraz I was considering! The group calls it “probably a Merlot,” which forces me to re-assess my opinion of it. It’s not really rich and chocolate-y enough to call a Merlot, but it does seem a little oxidative for a five year old Burgundy. I recall the natural wine shop where I bought it: I see the harsh light streaming in, the warmth surrounding me, the light breeze every time the door opens. Welp, I guess I can’t trust any wines I buy in there! I still think it’s delicious, but I’ll allow it wasn’t the best representation, and I feel better about giving the bottle away.

We wash dishes (excellent, no dirty glasses to ignore till a week from now!) and I make espressos for the group, and we part ways. I make some toast, bacon, and eggs (I definitely should have used that bacon sooner) and eat lunch while re-watching the last season of Silicon Valley. Afterward, I pop open my MacBook Pro and start working on my menu guide. It’s a pretty decent-sized document I’ve built to help the staff at Matsuhisa Denver, new and old alike, to retain information on our lengthy menu and dietary restrictions. Here’s the latest version:

These days I probably update it once every couple months, to change the BTGs or fix a dumb mistake I made (Hmmm, yeah, probably shouldn’t list edamame as safe for soy allergies). But I’m gratified when people catch my dumb mistakes–it means I’m giving them something valuable enough to keep in their server book and refer back to on a regular basis. I think it’s a large source of my credibility, along with my advanced pin and the questions I regularly drill people with at pre-shift. I finish my updates, but run short on time to print it off and turn it into a perfect physical booklet with a cover; that will have to wait for tomorrow. I leave for work.

I actually get there a few minutes late, but it’s fine. When I somm there, the managers’ priorities are, firstly, that I get my work done, and secondly, to minimize my overtime. I keep trying to pick up shifts to make as much money as last year, and getting rejected. Anyway, the day before I’d arrived way early to change out a lot of pages on the wine list and prepare and deliver a class on cordials and our house cocktails, so showing up a few minutes late today was just my way of bringing balance to the Force.

We eat makanai (sp?)–our restaurant staff meal–while I tinker with my website. It’s no longer embarrassing to call my own, it’s just a little content-poor. I bring liquor up from our downstairs storage to re-stock the bar, look at our beverage yamas (out-of-stocks), and plan what questions I’ll ask the servers today:

Tell me about our new Barolo and Red Burgundy by the glass!

What are three rums we have available?

What are our two shochus? The question trips up the server, and then me, but I redeem myself ten seconds later when I get the Hakutake Shiro and the Satsuma Shiranami properly sorted out.

Service begins and it’s looking like a busy Sunday. Two hundred twenty reservations on the books, and nearly no wine notes on the evening’s guests. This is going to be a back-serving type of Somm shift.

And for the most part, it is. I sell one table a couple bottles of 2018 Sea Smoke Ten Pinot Noir (too rich for my blood, and too rich for my palate) and a couple bottles of 2013 Dusky Goose Pinot (ahh, that’s more like it), and note that that’s the last of the Dusky Goose. I talk another table into a bottle of 2005 Defaix Côte de Lechets Premier Cru Chablis (the best example of cheesy lees done well), and our Head Somm chimes in from his day off to recommend a bottle of GG Peter Lauer Riesling for a guest he worked with in Vail. Dang, that’s some good juice. For most of the night, I’m just running around the dining room helping support the servers: filling waters, offering new cocktails, clearing and re-setting plates, shifting chairs, running food. One table is thrilled with a 2012 Cocito Barbaresco Riserva I served them, to the point where they ask for the label off the bottle. I heat up the bottle by filling it from our hot water dispenser to soften the adhesive, and painstakingly peel it off, trying not to rip it while getting jostled by the servers trying to work next to me. After I finally get it off, I cast around for something worth sticking it to. I settle on a sheet of Matsuhisa letterhead and then guillotine off the unused half of the base, and bring the label and denuded bottle back to the happy guests.

As service winds down, I consider what I’m going to eat. As a sommelier I get a $50 manager meal stipend, which is a pretty sweet deal when I’m hungry, and a valuable way to get to know our menu and specials. We’ve been running some fish tacos–an easy way to use up some sea bass scraps–with pan-seared sea bass, shredded Bibb and cilantro, finished with a spicy anticucho sauce in a crispy Gyoza shell. I choose an order of three of these, a Black Cod Lettuce Cup, and an Aspen Roll, and I share one of the tacos with a back server who just passed her final food test. I finish my meal (Holy mother, those tacos were delicious, Chef! Thank you!), re-stock some sake from downstairs while looking for more sparkling water, and prepare to leave as the Riesling drinkers decide to have one more bottle: something earthy, likely Bordeaux, for under $100. As we look at the menu together, I mention that on our list, Bordeaux for that price is a bit challenging, but we might go the route of Trousseau or a Clau de Nell Cab/Cab Franc blend–there’s value to be had when you go off the beaten path. Neither of these options suits him though, and he instead chooses a 2008 López de Heredia Rioja Reserva Viña Tondonia, which I can’t fault (except if he was willing to go above $100, he might have told me so!), as this is an icon of the wine world, and I’m constantly advocating that Rioja is one of the best wine values, since many producers age their wine till they feel they’re ready to drink, and charge modest prices for doing so. They offer me a taste, and I try to politely demur, and I eventually admit I’m doing a dry month. I generally try not to talk about it: I don’t want to preach, and guests are about as likely to trust a sommelier who isn’t drinking as much as a chef who isn’t eating. They get me to acquiesce, and I bring a spittoon with me. I try to graciously taste and gracefully spit, but I know I’m not presenting the spitting image of host in that moment. Oh well, asì es la vida. I drive home, consider whether I need to raise my wipers for snow tomorrow, and walk inside to post my first blog entry.

And I hear it’s tight

Most ev’ry night

But now I might be mistaken

Hmm, hmm, hmm…

Billy Gibbons, dusty hill, frank beard