We can all agree on one thing, while it may be difficult to get the best quality food at home, we can certainly get the wine. More and more guests are becoming knowledgable about fine wines. There are plenty of courses out there, magazines and books for the willing pupil to dig into. With this in mind, as a restaurateur, you will need to match up to their expectations when you think about your beverage offering.

At the high end, you would have a sommellier who would buy, store, match and advise on the wines and other drinks in your venue. A wine is very match a compliment to the food and not something seperate from it. When a taster menu is built, the wine flight is designed to match the flow of the courses throughout the meal.

Without going into a discourse about the care and selection of wines, because I can’t, I will put down a couple of pointers for using wine to maximum effect. Like the food menu, a wine menu is a sales tool. On it’s own it has no benefit unless there is a good sales person to use the tool. The key to getting the most out of your wine offering is training. If you have a good sommellier and they are good with customers and can meet all your guests in time, you are covered. However, let us look at the probable situation that the main front of house team will be spending that time with your customers. One of the most valuable tools is a crib matrix: food on one axis, wine on the other, where they cross it’s either do or don’t match. The chef and the sommellier are the two best people to put this together. With frequency of use, general staff become more confident in offering advice on wine purchases. Incidently, one practise that does need to be jumped on is the tip hound recommending the more expensive bottles rather than the most appropriate.

A fixed taster menu with wine flight is a great combination as you are able to gauge both food and wine stocks and issues very accurately up front. If you offer dessert wines, put this on the food menu, it upsells very well, stilton and port, classic end to a great meal.