Top Gun Sommelier – Lean Mean Service Machine – The Wandering Palate Circa 1988 - all of 25 years old, bravodo and people skills were the required skillset in those days
The Wandering Palate Circa 1988 at Jacques Reymond’s restaurant, Melbourne, Sommelier that evening for the Single Bottle Club Dinner and James Halliday’s 50th Birthday, having just grappled with a Salmanazar of 1937 Bollinger and about to pour the 1918 Oloroso Sherry Pilar Aranda…
The Wandering Palate turned 50 today, the 16th November, an auspicious day indeed and one of deep reflection. Actually, there’s no time for reflection as I am flat out designing a wine list for a new Chinese restaurant in Melbourne, “Mantong Kitchen” opening at Crowne Casino next month and there is a deadline to meet today for the first draft. Alas, no long lunch today… buggar… and not the WP’s normal form, perplexing really – that 30 years in the wine and hospitality business and I am still chasing my tail – “Once a Sommelier, Always a Sommelier”.
Nothwithstanding this great moment in time and confoundment that I made it this far (yes I know it’s a cliché, but in this case it’s true; just ask my mother, my motorcycle dealer, my psychiatrist, my commanding officer… but consistency has been the key, that is consistently Fuckin Up – as the lyrics of Neill Young so aptly describe, a fantastic jam with Young and Pearl Jam you must listen to… but there is more important news for today is a great day in ocean history… and I am a great believer that it is the ocean that will decide the fate of humanity, or that is how we are fucking it up, so to speak…
