These are the biggest blunders by top sommeliers, part two
Have you ever accidentally tipped a glass of red wine all over someone? You’re in good company—even top sommeliers at Michelin-starred restaurants have experienced it. And that’s not all…
Bram Faber, sommelier Wijncafé Lefebvre
“Christmas Eve, 5:50 p.m., ten minutes before service. The wine for the main course came from a 12-liter bottle and the cork broke off.. So it had to be pushed through, and you can guess what happened: a few seconds later, my spotless white shirt was covered in red stains. Merry Christmas!”
Laurence Reintjens, freelance sommelier
“Walking full-on into a closed glass door with a tray full of expensive wine glasses.”
Wouter van Essen, sommelier Wijn- en Eetbar Most
“Pouring red wine over a guest’s white trousers .”
Ruth Engels, sommelier INK Hotel Amsterdam
“In the past, we often had couples saber a bottle of champagne during the ceremony themselves (opening the bottle by tapping it with a sword). Naturally, we gave the groom clear instructions beforehand on how it worked. However, during one of the ceremonies, I forgot to chill the bottle.. When the moment of truth arrived and the groom wanted to saber the champagne, he couldn’t open the bottle with the sword because it was too warm. After the groom had tried ten times, with 150 guests watching, I had to take over and give him another bottle.”
Sabas Joosten, sommelier De Librije
“Letting a 1989 Jacquesson champagne, specially ordered because it was the birth-year vintage of a guest’s dining companion, slide underwater in the ice bucket. Goodbye ’89 Jacquesson—and there were no backup bottles...”
Julian Cleton, sommelier Wijnbar VinVin
“Pouring two different vintages of expensive Burgundy into the same glass. Oops.”
Ivar Roerink, sommelier Wijnbar Nic & ik
“I once mixed up two tables, meaning the guests received the wrong wines with the wrong dishes all evening.”
Maaike Kauffman, sommelier Héroine
“At my first internship, I was eventually allowed to take care of my own section of four tables. These guests had ordered a bottle of red wine, which the sommelier had already opened. So when the starter arrived, I topped up the glasses. It turned out they were still the aperitif glasses, which contained another red wine.”
Dennis Blaaser, sommelier Le Hollandais
“I once unknowingly corrected the head sommelier of a fairly prominent large hotel in Amsterdam when he announced his wine choice, and then offered him a (cheaper), more mature and better-suited wine, which he chose and drank with complete satisfaction—only to leave an incredibly glowing review afterward. When someone pointed it out to me at the end of the evening, I thought the ground would swallow me up.”
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