Inside Valentino: Piero Selvaggio on LA’s Italian Food Revolution and Wine Culture

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Now, from high atop his desk, get

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ready to peel it all back and

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get to the root of the subject, no

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pun intended. With Paul K.

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On Wine Talks,

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where he takes no prisoners and calls it

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the way he sees it.

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In 1981, somebody came to me in the early

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part of 1981. By that time, I was already getting serious

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about wine. I had stack of Robert Mondav in

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1974 that was considered

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already. You know something, Jewel? I remember the wines, right?

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I was very, very big collector of BB Private Reserve

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because, of course, you know, Chelycef was unique. But

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also I start becoming very serious about

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other California wines. And I was fascinated by California

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wines, although the strength of me has always been Italian

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wines. Yeah, of course. So at the beginning of the restaurant in

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1974, we started having a very

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steady customer that was a lawyer in Torrance named Jim Baritz. Yeah, hold

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on, let me start this. And you just don't. Don't forget that thought. No,

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I will. Okay. Welcome to Wine Talks with Paul Kay. We're available on Google

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Play, Spotify, Pandora, you name it. Wherever you hang out for podcasting,

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you can listen to Wine Talks with Paul K. And you're interrupting a conversation right

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now that. I'm having a tremendous conversation. An introduction to

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Piero Salvaggio. Right?

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Salvaggio. He is one of the great

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LA restaurateurs. And visiting us today in

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studio, sort of as we're winding out of this

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COVID 19 thing, we're going to talk about LA in the early days. We're gonna

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talk about wine, we're gonna talk about what's happening

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today and what happened in the days. And so he's in the middle of a

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story about our friend Jim Barrett, who was one of the regulars at

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my dad's wine shop and a good friend of the family. So he was a

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customer at Valentino. Right about when Valentino

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became a little famous. So we talk about 1974,

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when I was getting a little serious about wine, when I was getting a little

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serious about what food is all about. I had

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almost passed that connection that

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spaghetti and meatballs must be Italian and nothing else.

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So this gentleman became a very good customer. Him and

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his old law firm, actually. But they were in Torrance, weren't they? That's what they

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were, torrents. Yeah. You were in Santa Monica. I was in Santa Monica. But obviously,

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for good food, you travel. You travel, right? And

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within four or five visits, one day came with

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a bottle of wine. And he says, you didn't know I make wine too?

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I say, No, I thought you were a big lawyer.

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And I knew that Ernie Hahn, that was a major,

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Major investors and business

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developed as he developed a Palm Spring and so forth.

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Also gave Jim the idea to rebuild

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Chateau Montelena that was dormant for 100 years.

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And. And so he showed me this beautiful label,

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and he told me that he had a kind of a

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temperamental winemaker named Mike Gorguch.

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And that was the beginning of a great friendship. By the way, that

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bottle of Monteluina, Chateau Montalina was a

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Chardonnay that let her know within couple of years, became,

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you know, the big

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surprise in Paris. So the friendship

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lasted. I was a big, big supporter of Chateau Montelina until

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one day after Jim had retired, moved to the Napa

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Valley, and we kind of kept in talk and so forth.

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Around 1990,

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he says, send me a picture. And I said, jim, for

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what is it, an album or something? He says, no, you'll be surprised. So

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the surprise was a magnum of. Of Chateau

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Montelino Cabernet with my face on. Wow. Really? A

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beautiful magnum with my face. That's great. And I was very

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excited by that. And that became with another

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wine that was given to me by Franco Biondi,

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Santi. Like Bion di Santi, Brunello, 1891

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Brunello, one of three in the world. Wow. Yeah,

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those were the two showplays in my wine

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cellar. So everybody, of course, had to come, had to look around and then

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says, what are your two favorite wines? So I was pointing at that

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until a earthquake came in 1993.

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Oh, no. And sure enough, that

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day actually was January of 1994. My

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cellar got destroyed and we lost

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about 27,000 bottles of wine. Yeah, it was one of.

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It was one of the tragic things of the wine world, really.

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So as I'm cleaning Petrus and broken

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Gaia and broken Bordeaux, here is my

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favorite bottle of wine. The Chateau Montelina

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1986, with etched my face and

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everything. And of course, you know, I almost cried because that had an

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emotional value. So I called Jim and I said, you

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know, you won't believe it, and so forth. And I have to say that through

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the breakage and through the earthquake, the winners

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couldn't have been more generous, more supportive, really. I had been

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supporting them. It was vice versa. And so within a

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month of telling Jim what happened, there was another

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beautiful magnum of 1986,

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Chateau Montelina, with my hatching, but with a little difference.

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Earthquake Edition. Oh, that's so funny.

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Yes. Wow. What a great relationship. Yes. And that is back when was this so

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that was. Well, that obviously the 1996. 97.

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And so the first one was. Was in the Earlier. Earlier,

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yeah. So fast, fast forward. This is just

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the conclusion of this little story. Irene Birbilia, that was the

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restaurant critic for the LA Times, was assigned to do

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the obituary of Jim Barrett. So I didn't know

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that. So she called me and she says, piero, you

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know, I know that this guy founded the winery and this and that, but what

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do you know? So half of the obituary was about

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my story because Jim was such a quiet,

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low key person and such a splendid person.

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So this was a little token to his generosity. That

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is really a great story because I've been doing a

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Judgment of Paris series. You just added to it with

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that story because growing up Palace Verdes, I knew the

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Barretts, I surfed with the Sun. Long story short,

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I had Bo Barrett on the show already. I've had Steven Spurrier, all that. And

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so this is a wonderful addition to the story. I just want to

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touch one thing for the listeners. You know, our paths have

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probably crossed dozens of times. I've been to the restaurant many times, particularly for

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trade tastings, which you were very well known for putting on, particularly Italian

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wines. But the LA

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food scene, particularly in

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72, when you started, that was 72 or 74? 72.

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72, when you started was nothing. I mean, what did we

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have? Well, and I brought up the word. The names that you just brought up

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and I brought up, I have them here for a different reason. And I'll get

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to that in a second. But there was Chasen's and they had chili and there

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was what, the Brown Derby. And I'll throw another one at you. The Windsor.

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Behind the Windsor. Ben Dimmesdale was a wonderful, quiet

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gentleman. And remember that that

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Middle Wilshire at that time was a much better location. Perino was

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down the street. Perino's, right? Yeah. What

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wasn't exciting was downtown. Downtown was a wasteland for

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restaurant. And the west side wasn't

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explosive like it became eventually. So I

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texted my wife this morning because I took her to the Windsor for a

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Valentine's dinner. Like when we first got married or I don't remember exactly one is.

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And she's like, why are you asking me that? Cause I couldn't remember the name

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of the restaurant. And then it hit me. It was the Windsor. And I just

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told her because I was thinking about her and I wanted to remember those days,

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but I was actually trying to remember what was happening early on in the

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LA food scene that you decided to open an

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Italian restaurant. And you brought it up a little bit that Italian restaurants were just

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red checkerboard cloth pizza and pasta, you know, spaghetti and meatballs.

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What led you to this idea that it's time for sort of a higher

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end Italian food restaurant? Well, everything has a

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purpose. I started with a partner that knew

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how to cook Neapolitan food. And what I mean, without

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any sense of negativity. It was more of the

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immigrant food what was brought here. Just like

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the Chinese at that time. Everything was Cantonese or the Mexican

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was Tex Mex or whatever, you know. Italian food at that time

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was poorly represented because there were no great

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chefs. And the few great chefs were doing what we

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call continental cuisine. They were almost embarrassed

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to use the word Italian as a mainstay, really.

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So Gianni Paoletti, that was the partner with whom I

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opened Valentino, knew pretty much that kind of cuisine. And that went on

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until we split. And after we split, I realized

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that, you know, there were complaints about the food

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and I wasn't a chef. So

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finally one day the blow came. A very, very

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kind of respected person that was

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president of latter Wine and Food Society. Things were really happening

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in the world of wine and food. Told me how

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brilliant I was in my moving around and being a host.

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But how bad was my food? Honest, isn't

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it? It was as honest and it was the best blow I've ever gotten.

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Because he made me realize that what he was saying,

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which was, look how packed you are. And then pretty soon you're going to be

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fmt. Look how suddenly you're scratching your head and

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say, what do I do? And it's too late. So I came up

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with a stupid answer which was, well, I don't have a chef because

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chefs are white flies. So he was smoking his cigar

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calmly at that time. You could do that. And he says, well, go and find

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the white fly. So he put me on my horse and

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there was a little retro story, which was

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that a major journalist from Italy that had

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founded a magazine called Wine and Spirits of Italy,

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which at the time was Civil Tea del Bere, had come to do a dossier

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about Italian wine in America. And it was desperate. In New

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York, it didn't find anything exciting except the usual

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consortium wines. In San Francisco, it was

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shocked to see north beach. The great bottles of Brunello and

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Barolo. At that time, probably the best Barolo was Pio Cesar

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and the best Brunello was Biondi Santi were lingering in the

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sun, being roasted almost. This is 70 something.

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78. Okay. In the Later. Okay, good. Yes. And so

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finally the Italian consulate told them, there is this kid

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that, you know, is doing nice things with Italian wine,

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et cetera, et cetera. So he came, we became friends, and as

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I took him around, he says, you know, I like to reciprocate if ever

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you come to Italy. When I realized that I

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needed help, I reached to him and I went to Milan,

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his guest. And I finally understood what

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Italian food was. I discovered

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fresh white truffles. I discovered that there is romit

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cocarpaccio, that it was divine. I discovered

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that there were so many wonderful cheeses and olive oil

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and so forth. So it was a revelation. And coming back for me

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was, hey, I have to be as good as these people.

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So now I'm still called the

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Italian Maestro because we brought the first buffalo mozzarella,

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we brought the first burrata, we brought some

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of the very first great wines. The winners

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became my friends. They all became these

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people that needed what we call the altare. The altar. And

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Valentino became the altar for them. So suddenly,

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thanks to Pino, that brought Pinocheil, that brought a lot

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of this vineyards to me, suddenly I am in speaking

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terms and good friend with Piero Antinori, with Angelo

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Gaia, with Antonio Masso Berardino, with anybody

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who's whom, Italian wine that have become the

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pioneer and the ambassador of what is Italian wine today. It's

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phenomenal. You know, there's a. I had an

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Umbrian. No, Montefalco wine over here.

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Valentino Valentini. Yeah, the mayor of

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Montefalco, the wonderful guy. We became friends. They make sagrantino.

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Yeah, we became good friends. That just

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short paragraph touched on so many subjects about the food and wine

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business in Los Angeles and what you did for Italian food. Because

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let's not forget that Catherine de Medici from Florence

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came to France and taught them how to cook. Right. Don't tell the French this,

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but. No, but they smile about what they know. You

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know, that the fork were brought by. Yes, exactly. The fork. So.

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But what's interesting to me because I was

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reading about, for instance, Le Pavillon and Henri Soleil in New York and

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Lou Tess with Andre Sultner, he's going to be on the show. And then

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there's a book out called Chef's Drugs and Rock and Roll. It's about the

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transformation of LA food in the 80s. I was part of it. Yes. Right.

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So. So you. Here you are in

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1972. This wine really isn't part of the menu

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anywhere, really. Right. And we. We didn't have much in California anyway. You mentioned the

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names. That's. That's what I stocked the shelves with in my dad's store.

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And, and was there really any scene in

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California, in Los Angeles where wine and food were

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connected, where you. Where you went to have a

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glass of wine and to share that with some food or vice versa? Was there

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any place like that then? No, because we were the first one

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that in the 80s, we suddenly had the first one

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page wine list made by Charlotte,

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which of course included bohemian and bohemian and Western,

241
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which of course included Lancers, Matuse, Blunon,

242
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Almaden and so forth. Suddenly we woke

243
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up to the fact, hey, we bought the first five cases

244
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of Sterling Cabernet

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1969. Because it was just this new

246
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big thing of this gorgeous winery way up in Santa Elena.

247
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We bought the very first Hal Bronstein, Diamond Creek.

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This crazy guy that says, my wine is like jewel. It was the

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first one to have $100 cabernet, if you remember the Lake

250
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vineyard. So we were in the path.

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One page became 10 page became 50 pages.

252
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And already at that time, I was so

253
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serious about wine, especially after the visit of Pinoch Isle and all of the

254
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Italian vineyards. So I gotta have. It became my fever, became the

255
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excitement. And I was the first one to explain

256
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people how important was the connection of a chef

257
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knowing what to cook compared to wine. Because also

258
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those first awakening at that time was more

259
00:16:03,260 --> 00:16:06,900
wine and food societies and so forth. Now you have a lot of private groups,

260
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as you know, that have their own. Their own

261
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tasting, et cetera, et cetera, right? And so one day

262
00:16:13,980 --> 00:16:17,660
in 1980, late 80s,

263
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this gentleman came, nice and chubby and he says, you know, I hear you have

264
00:16:21,020 --> 00:16:24,830
a very good wine list. And I figured, you know, okay. So he

265
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says, can I see it? Okay. He says, look, I

266
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just bought a magazine in San Diego and it was a

267
00:16:32,310 --> 00:16:36,030
six page throwaway magazine. He says, but I'm going to turn it

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into the most famous and most important wine magazine in the world.

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Marvin Schenken, his name was Marvin Schenkin. So

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when he went back to New

271
00:16:47,590 --> 00:16:51,310
York and did this growing and development of the magazine,

272
00:16:51,310 --> 00:16:54,600
he says, well, I have a good news for you. We are going to award

273
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the best 10 wine list

274
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restaurant program in the country. And you're one of them. Wow. So we

275
00:17:02,240 --> 00:17:06,040
got the first Grand Award in 1981. And we kept it

276
00:17:06,040 --> 00:17:09,240
until we closed the restaurant, which was in 19, in

277
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2018. That's okay, that's.

278
00:17:12,760 --> 00:17:16,560
Yeah, you are. This is really fun. An hour is not going to be

279
00:17:16,560 --> 00:17:20,160
enough because you just touched on a whole bunch of other things. In fact,

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I. I was interviewing a woman in

281
00:17:23,790 --> 00:17:27,310
Napa. Her name was Joanne Dupuis. She's 93 years old. She's a fascinating woman.

282
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She had a lot to do with the judgment of Paris because she was the

283
00:17:30,790 --> 00:17:34,590
one that toured Steven Spurrier around Napa. But also,

284
00:17:35,070 --> 00:17:38,870
since you brought up Marvin Schenkin, she, one of

285
00:17:38,870 --> 00:17:42,510
her tour guides, when they went to France on Bordeaux

286
00:17:42,510 --> 00:17:45,990
tastings, was the guy that sold the magazine to

287
00:17:45,990 --> 00:17:49,540
Marvin Schenken. I can't remember his name. I have the brochure somewhere. So

288
00:17:49,780 --> 00:17:53,140
this evolution of what's happening in the world of food and wine

289
00:17:54,260 --> 00:17:57,980
is occurring as you're making it happen. This is happening

290
00:17:57,980 --> 00:18:01,380
because you're stirring the pot. You went to Milan, you discussed it

291
00:18:01,620 --> 00:18:05,380
with the chefs in Italy, and you brought these ideas back

292
00:18:05,780 --> 00:18:08,740
because I wrote to you in an email and we were talking about

293
00:18:09,700 --> 00:18:13,540
the growth of indigenous foods in indigenous wines. And I

294
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have this, I have this theory, usually corroborated by

295
00:18:17,100 --> 00:18:20,820
chefs, that yes, there's Tuscan foods that are

296
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meant for Tuscan wines, and there's Umbrian foods and there's Burgundy foods. And

297
00:18:24,460 --> 00:18:27,260
that's what's happening. But you did something different

298
00:18:28,060 --> 00:18:31,700
because you have this abridged list.

299
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Apparently that's not as big as it used to be. That's huge in front of

300
00:18:35,020 --> 00:18:38,740
me. But you have an amazing array of not only California,

301
00:18:38,740 --> 00:18:41,880
but Italian and French. For those Spanish wines.

302
00:18:42,440 --> 00:18:46,000
And I think that's really interesting because there are

303
00:18:46,000 --> 00:18:49,640
vendors that come here that only sell French wines. And they often say, you know,

304
00:18:49,640 --> 00:18:52,600
I've been trying to get into an Italian restaurant and they're telling me, we don't

305
00:18:52,600 --> 00:18:56,400
sell French wines. We don't sell French wines in this Italian place. So

306
00:18:56,400 --> 00:19:00,200
tell me how this evolved. Well, first of all, there are very few

307
00:19:00,360 --> 00:19:04,120
Italian restaurants. There are a ton of trattorias, ton

308
00:19:04,120 --> 00:19:07,560
of wonderful, comfortable family

309
00:19:07,560 --> 00:19:11,220
style restaurant. But the word restaurant in

310
00:19:11,220 --> 00:19:14,820
this town that I know beside Valentino was

311
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Rex. Rex was downtown and it was another

312
00:19:18,380 --> 00:19:21,860
great classic. And I was kind of involved with it.

313
00:19:22,420 --> 00:19:25,620
And then on the later side, we

314
00:19:26,020 --> 00:19:29,700
haven't had really an Italian

315
00:19:29,700 --> 00:19:33,420
restaurant of that caliber in Los Angeles.

316
00:19:33,420 --> 00:19:37,010
We have had it around the country. As a matter of fact, awards had been

317
00:19:37,010 --> 00:19:40,850
given to Felidia, the Bastianich lady that was

318
00:19:40,850 --> 00:19:44,570
in partner with Mario Batali. The award was given to

319
00:19:44,650 --> 00:19:47,690
a Tuscan fellow in Washington called Galileo.

320
00:19:48,570 --> 00:19:51,930
Chicago had a long, long time

321
00:19:52,970 --> 00:19:56,730
existing restaurant called the Italian Village that had a good wine

322
00:19:56,730 --> 00:20:00,570
program. But we just manufactured

323
00:20:00,570 --> 00:20:04,250
and developed the idea that Italian food can go

324
00:20:04,250 --> 00:20:08,010
with anything. And wines of

325
00:20:08,010 --> 00:20:11,850
the world can be connected to everything. I

326
00:20:11,850 --> 00:20:15,490
mean, you know, it's an amazing concept, really. Right. Particularly at that time. Yeah.

327
00:20:15,490 --> 00:20:19,330
And that has always worked extremely well from us.

328
00:20:19,890 --> 00:20:23,570
Valentino was in a very, very unique location. You

329
00:20:23,570 --> 00:20:27,210
had to really find it. It was way, way at the beginning of the west

330
00:20:27,210 --> 00:20:30,730
side. And he wasn't a great location and so forth. But

331
00:20:30,970 --> 00:20:34,570
everybody knew that it was a restaurant where

332
00:20:34,890 --> 00:20:38,650
service was very important. And we got a ton of James Beard Award because of

333
00:20:38,650 --> 00:20:42,490
it. Wine was extremely important because it

334
00:20:42,490 --> 00:20:46,250
was always the catalyst that made the difference between us and other

335
00:20:46,250 --> 00:20:49,970
people. You know, people palatal where they are, especially in Los Angeles. You

336
00:20:49,970 --> 00:20:53,810
go where it's at, what is trendy and so forth. We were there. If

337
00:20:53,810 --> 00:20:57,570
you want to have a great meal with a great bottle of wine, it doesn't

338
00:20:57,570 --> 00:21:01,410
matter if it's an old Bordeaux, a great Burgundy or whatever,

339
00:21:01,570 --> 00:21:04,770
you can go to Valentino. And a lot of people were calling us just if

340
00:21:04,770 --> 00:21:08,610
we had the vintage, you know, a 61 or a 82 or

341
00:21:08,610 --> 00:21:11,650
whatever. All of that

342
00:21:12,290 --> 00:21:15,490
make us develop the sense that

343
00:21:16,050 --> 00:21:19,490
wine is important in any kind of restaurant. And then

344
00:21:20,470 --> 00:21:24,110
slowly, as progression has happened with the taste of

345
00:21:24,110 --> 00:21:27,670
people and the knowledge of people and the traveling of people, we

346
00:21:27,670 --> 00:21:31,390
have now Italian wines in French restaurant, Italian

347
00:21:31,390 --> 00:21:34,550
wines all over American restaurant and why not

348
00:21:34,630 --> 00:21:38,310
pasta and all of the good Italian things in French restaurant

349
00:21:38,310 --> 00:21:42,030
and American restaurant and so forth. Look, everybody has

350
00:21:42,030 --> 00:21:44,630
burrat on the menu now. That's right. Yeah.

351
00:21:45,590 --> 00:21:49,290
Well, my cousin owns me Piache, my wife's cousin.

352
00:21:49,290 --> 00:21:53,050
And they have a French cook and they have amazing burrata, which

353
00:21:53,050 --> 00:21:56,370
is hilarious because it's a triangle. Right. You said something

354
00:21:57,010 --> 00:21:59,890
earlier, and I want to touch on this because I think it's an important

355
00:22:00,610 --> 00:22:02,610
of the evolution of what you've done.

356
00:22:04,370 --> 00:22:08,130
And I'm going to ask you the question about the confusion, I think,

357
00:22:08,130 --> 00:22:10,850
for the consumer today with food and restaurants. And we'll talk about that in a

358
00:22:10,850 --> 00:22:14,340
second. But the question is this. There are chef

359
00:22:14,340 --> 00:22:17,340
centric restaurants. Or I'm going to say chef and proprietor

360
00:22:18,140 --> 00:22:21,940
centric restaurants. Yes. That people go to. They went to because

361
00:22:21,940 --> 00:22:25,580
Piero was there or your chef was there and Piero

362
00:22:25,580 --> 00:22:29,380
orchestrated this wine list and the foods and traveled to make sure that

363
00:22:29,380 --> 00:22:32,220
was. And then there's the corporate restaurants. And

364
00:22:34,620 --> 00:22:38,380
I think the consumer is confused with what

365
00:22:38,380 --> 00:22:42,210
really good food should be today. There's so many. There's

366
00:22:42,210 --> 00:22:46,010
so much messaging. And I want to get your take on, like

367
00:22:46,010 --> 00:22:49,450
how do we particularly in today's environment where it's very

368
00:22:49,450 --> 00:22:53,090
expensive to run a restaurant. Do we pull off making a

369
00:22:53,090 --> 00:22:56,810
restaurant like Valentino that people. Let me get to the point.

370
00:22:57,370 --> 00:23:00,010
You made wine and food an experience,

371
00:23:01,370 --> 00:23:05,090
not what is trained today in most restaurants. Like, hey, you can double the

372
00:23:05,090 --> 00:23:08,550
food bill with a bottle of wine or two cocktails or whatever you're trying to

373
00:23:08,550 --> 00:23:11,110
do. That's the point of that is I want to double the food bill, I

374
00:23:11,110 --> 00:23:14,710
want to double that ticket. But that's not what your objective was. Your objective was

375
00:23:15,110 --> 00:23:18,390
to create an experience of food and wine

376
00:23:19,030 --> 00:23:22,630
origin notwithstanding. Well,

377
00:23:22,710 --> 00:23:26,364
let's say that as the evolution I was telling you in the 80s,

378
00:23:26,456 --> 00:23:30,270
90s, in the 2000s, suddenly, thanks to my good friend Wolf

379
00:23:30,270 --> 00:23:34,000
and Pack, it became chef oriented. It

380
00:23:34,000 --> 00:23:37,120
became that California food

381
00:23:37,760 --> 00:23:41,360
that eventually was even called California cuisine, even if that's not

382
00:23:41,360 --> 00:23:44,800
fair, became the idea

383
00:23:44,880 --> 00:23:48,000
of what people like, freshness,

384
00:23:48,480 --> 00:23:52,120
farmer's market, creativity. And

385
00:23:52,120 --> 00:23:54,880
even the wine and the vineyards kind of

386
00:23:56,080 --> 00:23:59,720
bended a little bit in that direction. So this is

387
00:23:59,720 --> 00:24:03,560
always the great thing about California because of a lot of

388
00:24:03,560 --> 00:24:07,360
good qualities, climate and so forth, we have always been

389
00:24:07,360 --> 00:24:10,520
in the cutting edge of anything else that happens in America.

390
00:24:11,080 --> 00:24:14,759
So California wines are made here. A lot of the

391
00:24:14,759 --> 00:24:18,560
products are developed here and produced here. So all

392
00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:21,880
of that has made us kind of unique

393
00:24:22,120 --> 00:24:25,720
and also very receptive and

394
00:24:25,720 --> 00:24:28,730
be receptive and all of this because

395
00:24:29,290 --> 00:24:33,050
after all, you know, you get tired of the same

396
00:24:33,290 --> 00:24:36,930
routine, especially the press needs to write about something

397
00:24:36,930 --> 00:24:40,490
new. That's true. I just pitch a small

398
00:24:40,490 --> 00:24:44,090
little restaurant in Culver City that serves Sardinian

399
00:24:44,090 --> 00:24:47,690
cuisine. And every time I've been talking to somebody, they say,

400
00:24:47,930 --> 00:24:51,610
what do they serve in Sardinia? And that tells you how

401
00:24:52,010 --> 00:24:55,190
difficult has been to single hand

402
00:24:55,590 --> 00:24:59,430
tradition that goes back centuries and centuries. Same thing with

403
00:24:59,430 --> 00:25:03,110
Sicily, same thing with the southern Italians. So all

404
00:25:03,110 --> 00:25:06,790
of that has though had better

405
00:25:06,870 --> 00:25:10,710
reception because there is much more culture, there is a Google,

406
00:25:11,270 --> 00:25:14,790
there is the possibility of good people that know

407
00:25:14,870 --> 00:25:18,630
how to develop this taste. And so wine has

408
00:25:18,630 --> 00:25:22,470
become also more important to all of these things. Because

409
00:25:22,630 --> 00:25:26,350
if you want a crispy fresh Sardinian wine, you will be amazed how

410
00:25:26,350 --> 00:25:29,990
many there are. Love the whites. The whites, yeah. The Vermentino

411
00:25:30,230 --> 00:25:33,750
and Azolia. That's a Sicilian wine. A Sicilian, right?

412
00:25:33,990 --> 00:25:37,750
Grillo in Zolia, Yes, Catarrato and so forth. And all of those

413
00:25:37,750 --> 00:25:41,190
wines are from the Etna, from the volcano, which is

414
00:25:41,270 --> 00:25:45,110
really that rich volcanic soil, et cetera. And they go

415
00:25:45,110 --> 00:25:48,920
very well with, almost psychologically they go very

416
00:25:48,920 --> 00:25:52,400
well with that kind of food. But that doesn't mean that they don't go very

417
00:25:52,400 --> 00:25:56,160
well with a simple grilled swordfish or with a

418
00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:59,800
simple, you know, saute of shrimps. And then,

419
00:26:00,760 --> 00:26:04,600
look, the Italians make Riesling. The Italians make

420
00:26:04,600 --> 00:26:07,640
in the north, in the stream north, they make anything that is,

421
00:26:08,840 --> 00:26:12,630
let's say, Alsatian style and so forth. So

422
00:26:12,790 --> 00:26:16,510
we do have all of these things, and we can

423
00:26:16,510 --> 00:26:20,190
match without thinking, this is Italian. This is a good glass

424
00:26:20,190 --> 00:26:23,590
of wine. This is an appropriate glass of wine. So

425
00:26:23,590 --> 00:26:27,270
chefs learn in turn how important was the wine

426
00:26:27,270 --> 00:26:30,870
with their cooking. And so they didn't just cook with it. They

427
00:26:30,870 --> 00:26:34,070
started realizing matching with it. And that has become

428
00:26:34,470 --> 00:26:37,990
one of the nice satisfaction that we have been having

429
00:26:38,490 --> 00:26:41,530
in the last 10 years of young chefs

430
00:26:42,090 --> 00:26:45,610
that, as they go to culinary school, take not only food

431
00:26:45,610 --> 00:26:49,290
program, but wine program, young chef

432
00:26:49,290 --> 00:26:52,730
that have been working under big star, like it could be

433
00:26:52,730 --> 00:26:56,330
Daniel Boulou, Wolfenpak, Alice Quarter, et

434
00:26:56,330 --> 00:27:00,090
cetera. And in turn, they want to develop their

435
00:27:00,090 --> 00:27:03,770
own style and matching it with something that is wine.

436
00:27:04,380 --> 00:27:08,140
So there is a creativity that is dictated by the fact

437
00:27:08,140 --> 00:27:11,940
that we have all grown and the new generation is growing and trying

438
00:27:11,940 --> 00:27:15,340
to have an identity on his own. And what's new, what's hot

439
00:27:15,740 --> 00:27:19,300
could be also very seriously interpreted. That's an interesting

440
00:27:19,300 --> 00:27:23,100
point, because as we talked about indigenous wines and indigenous

441
00:27:23,100 --> 00:27:26,940
places, and I brought that up with Jacques Lardier at Gilloux

442
00:27:26,940 --> 00:27:30,500
Jadot years ago, and I said, we don't have that in

443
00:27:30,500 --> 00:27:34,170
California because we don't have indigenous grapes. You know, even Zinfandel, now

444
00:27:34,170 --> 00:27:37,770
proven to be from Croatia. He said, but that's the beauty of

445
00:27:38,010 --> 00:27:41,770
America. It's the new world. You get to do new things.

446
00:27:41,930 --> 00:27:45,770
And there's no boundaries. We're not. California is the pinnacle of all of

447
00:27:45,770 --> 00:27:49,290
that. So let's touch on that a second. In the book, you were talking about

448
00:27:49,290 --> 00:27:53,090
chef's drugs and rock and roll and the evolution of the French cuisine, the

449
00:27:53,090 --> 00:27:56,770
heavy sauces. I mean, you know, Le Pavian and, you know, one seat

450
00:27:56,770 --> 00:27:59,690
per night, and then Lutece after that.

451
00:28:00,800 --> 00:28:03,760
LA seemed to have been the hotbed of

452
00:28:04,080 --> 00:28:07,840
cultural change when it came to food. Yes, I will

453
00:28:07,840 --> 00:28:11,320
put two people into the path that's

454
00:28:11,320 --> 00:28:14,560
responsible for a lot of the things that have changed in la.

455
00:28:15,360 --> 00:28:18,920
If you talk about Italian, Italian wines and Italian

456
00:28:18,920 --> 00:28:22,000
everything, then I will take. Yes, you should take.

457
00:28:22,720 --> 00:28:26,480
But two of my closest friends, one is Wolf

458
00:28:26,480 --> 00:28:29,800
and Pack and one is Michael McCarthy, were instrumental

459
00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:33,920
to go into this next development. You mentioned a book that is based

460
00:28:33,920 --> 00:28:37,720
and Inspired on Michael McCarty creating Michael's in Santa

461
00:28:37,720 --> 00:28:40,640
Monica. That's right. Michael was the complete

462
00:28:40,640 --> 00:28:44,120
transcending revolution of a restaurant. There was a house

463
00:28:44,440 --> 00:28:47,640
turned into restaurant with a beautiful patio

464
00:28:48,040 --> 00:28:51,600
with a brilliant sommelier, Philippe

465
00:28:51,600 --> 00:28:54,770
Reich. That was one of the unique,

466
00:28:56,290 --> 00:28:59,410
kind of unusual human being that was

467
00:29:00,050 --> 00:29:03,330
looking at wine intellectually almost.

468
00:29:03,810 --> 00:29:07,570
And he was very open about wine programs and what

469
00:29:07,570 --> 00:29:11,290
wine to serve with food. Michaels also was the first

470
00:29:11,290 --> 00:29:15,090
one to have this feeling about California means bounties.

471
00:29:15,170 --> 00:29:19,010
Every plate was beautifully ornate with lots of vegetables, with

472
00:29:19,230 --> 00:29:22,990
clean sauces, with a certain elegance. And if

473
00:29:22,990 --> 00:29:26,710
you go and back go look at the book, the

474
00:29:26,710 --> 00:29:30,110
COVID of Chefs and Rock and Roll is

475
00:29:30,110 --> 00:29:33,630
Michael and Mark Peel and Jonathan Waxman and all of

476
00:29:33,950 --> 00:29:37,470
Ken Frank, all of the chefs that came from that. Wolf, of course,

477
00:29:37,710 --> 00:29:41,550
did the most incredible thing. He opened the kitchen.

478
00:29:41,710 --> 00:29:45,150
So the chef became a star. He

479
00:29:45,150 --> 00:29:48,650
decided that pizza was more than just a

480
00:29:48,650 --> 00:29:52,490
simple pie. But he could shave truffles on top, he

481
00:29:52,490 --> 00:29:56,290
could have smoked salmon on top and caviar. So a

482
00:29:56,290 --> 00:29:59,650
poor person dish

483
00:29:59,810 --> 00:30:03,410
became raised to new heights.

484
00:30:03,650 --> 00:30:07,410
And with that, of course, all of the quality of the ingredients. Because

485
00:30:08,290 --> 00:30:12,050
at that time there was a farm in San Diego called Chino

486
00:30:12,050 --> 00:30:15,540
Farms. And they were flying those

487
00:30:15,540 --> 00:30:19,060
vegetables that are probably some of the very best at that time to either

488
00:30:19,060 --> 00:30:22,580
Alice water the cheapness or at Spago. So

489
00:30:22,660 --> 00:30:26,420
this was where everybody just started looking that a restaurant

490
00:30:26,420 --> 00:30:29,700
was a theater. It was a theater where there was everything,

491
00:30:29,940 --> 00:30:33,660
people watching, elegance, casualness.

492
00:30:33,660 --> 00:30:37,300
Because we are very casual in our way of

493
00:30:37,380 --> 00:30:41,180
living. But at the same time, food and wine had to

494
00:30:41,180 --> 00:30:44,740
be impeccable. And that was also the time where

495
00:30:44,980 --> 00:30:48,740
wine kind of raised the bar to

496
00:30:49,220 --> 00:30:52,860
liquor and to alcohol and to, you

497
00:30:52,860 --> 00:30:56,420
know, to hard liquors. Because at that time,

498
00:30:56,660 --> 00:31:00,500
wine seemed to be the natural thing. You could get away in a

499
00:31:00,500 --> 00:31:04,220
restaurant and have ingested wine and beer license. And it was good enough

500
00:31:04,220 --> 00:31:07,700
and you were well respected. The customer was happy with that. Yes,

501
00:31:08,020 --> 00:31:11,700
now the new generation is going back more to the tequila shots

502
00:31:12,500 --> 00:31:15,840
and to alcohol and so forth, you know,

503
00:31:16,000 --> 00:31:19,760
hard liquid, et cetera. But when you eat,

504
00:31:19,760 --> 00:31:23,560
you still have to have that corner. And I think one of

505
00:31:23,560 --> 00:31:27,280
the more interesting things that have happened in the last 15 years

506
00:31:27,440 --> 00:31:30,880
out of marketing reason is the wine by the glass.

507
00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:35,280
So now the wine by the glass has allow you to discover,

508
00:31:35,360 --> 00:31:38,880
especially if there is a good wine program behind, to discover

509
00:31:38,880 --> 00:31:42,660
more than one thing. So you can have a little sauvignon blanche and

510
00:31:42,660 --> 00:31:46,460
after that have a little Vermentino and

511
00:31:46,460 --> 00:31:49,940
so forth. And after that, et cetera, et cetera, if you want to play that

512
00:31:49,940 --> 00:31:53,620
way. But the idea is also Introduce the

513
00:31:53,620 --> 00:31:56,620
same people that were introduced to Coca Cola and to

514
00:31:56,620 --> 00:32:00,220
Lambrusco and to Blunan. It's coming back. Lambrusco,

515
00:32:00,460 --> 00:32:04,140
yes, because he's very good. I mean, as long as you produce

516
00:32:04,380 --> 00:32:07,900
a great wine, even Lambrusco could be a good wine. You know,

517
00:32:08,060 --> 00:32:11,820
I got to go back. Just a minute. I

518
00:32:11,820 --> 00:32:15,460
ran a Wolfgang at a port tasting recently, and

519
00:32:15,460 --> 00:32:18,340
I don't know him, and I wanted to talk to him because

520
00:32:19,060 --> 00:32:22,740
when he bought the Spago, which was originally Kavkaz, which is an

521
00:32:22,740 --> 00:32:25,460
armenian restaurant from Mr. Mercarian. Well, Mr.

522
00:32:25,460 --> 00:32:29,260
Markarian's grandson is my doctor. And so the

523
00:32:29,260 --> 00:32:32,900
book Kavkaz is a fascinating book, Even has

524
00:32:32,900 --> 00:32:36,180
some of his wife's recipes. But I sat down with Wolfgang, I said,

525
00:32:37,270 --> 00:32:40,390
instead of saying something like, oh, I love your food, or High Chef, I said,

526
00:32:40,390 --> 00:32:43,430
can you tell me about what happened with Kafka?

527
00:32:44,230 --> 00:32:47,710
And his face changed. Because this is going back to the beginning, right? He says,

528
00:32:47,710 --> 00:32:51,390
well, I went back into the kitchen and Marion told me, please get me out

529
00:32:51,390 --> 00:32:55,150
of here because my husband's in the front talking to the customers, and I'm

530
00:32:55,150 --> 00:32:58,630
back here working. And that's when they made the deal to buy

531
00:32:58,630 --> 00:33:02,430
Kavkoz. And there's a whole amazing story about Kafka and Shanghai

532
00:33:02,430 --> 00:33:04,530
and Russia and all this stuff, but we won't get there. I want to ask

533
00:33:04,530 --> 00:33:08,370
you this question, and I don't know about the Italian chefs,

534
00:33:08,370 --> 00:33:12,090
but certainly chefdom in France with the MOF

535
00:33:12,090 --> 00:33:15,610
program and the awards, the national awards

536
00:33:15,690 --> 00:33:19,490
for chef quality chefs has been around for a long,

537
00:33:19,490 --> 00:33:22,810
long time, and it's an esteemed position,

538
00:33:23,610 --> 00:33:27,370
and it is now in America as well. But it wasn't then, when

539
00:33:27,610 --> 00:33:30,850
you're talking, it wasn't until the McCarties and the Franks and the Joaquim

540
00:33:30,850 --> 00:33:34,520
Splichows and those people came and Wolfgang, that made it happen. Why

541
00:33:34,520 --> 00:33:37,960
is that? And was that in Italy at the time?

542
00:33:38,600 --> 00:33:42,440
Was sheftum an important job? Well, the French have always been

543
00:33:42,440 --> 00:33:46,040
highly regarded. They invented the Michelin guide.

544
00:33:46,440 --> 00:33:50,240
They invented the whole idea of expensive fine dining. They

545
00:33:50,240 --> 00:33:53,400
invented the idea that great French wine

546
00:33:54,040 --> 00:33:57,520
had to be in the great tables of the world, et cetera, et

547
00:33:57,520 --> 00:34:00,970
cetera. But they've always been

548
00:34:01,290 --> 00:34:04,410
leaders of all of these things.

549
00:34:04,890 --> 00:34:08,570
You know, let's face it, Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir,

550
00:34:08,570 --> 00:34:11,770
Chardonnay. We're talking about French wines. Yeah, they're French varietals.

551
00:34:12,330 --> 00:34:16,170
The inspiration to elegance, presentation and

552
00:34:16,330 --> 00:34:19,850
quality goes back to French wine,

553
00:34:19,930 --> 00:34:23,730
to French cuisine. The fact that

554
00:34:23,730 --> 00:34:27,290
they had some of the greatest chef Going way, way

555
00:34:27,290 --> 00:34:30,299
back in the previous centuries

556
00:34:30,859 --> 00:34:34,539
tells you that they have a history. And so when the

557
00:34:34,539 --> 00:34:38,139
Americans had to look and develop something

558
00:34:38,219 --> 00:34:41,659
that special, some of the better French chef came to

559
00:34:42,219 --> 00:34:45,739
America. And there was Andre Sultner of Lutece. There was here

560
00:34:45,819 --> 00:34:49,099
a wonderful chef named Jean Bertranoux that

561
00:34:49,659 --> 00:34:52,859
also did the path with l'. Hermitage.

562
00:34:53,830 --> 00:34:57,270
Joaquin, of course, came much after with the French

563
00:34:57,670 --> 00:35:01,510
approach. And there was a great restaurant in

564
00:35:01,510 --> 00:35:05,030
Chicago called La Perroquet. There was lots of great

565
00:35:05,030 --> 00:35:08,630
restaurant in New York, all French oriented. So the idea was

566
00:35:09,270 --> 00:35:13,110
respect and giving credit to whatever

567
00:35:13,110 --> 00:35:16,390
was that made fine dining in this country

568
00:35:17,270 --> 00:35:20,710
first a reality and then an inspiration to

569
00:35:20,710 --> 00:35:24,220
everybody else. Our approach was different because

570
00:35:25,180 --> 00:35:28,860
Italian food is lasting much more than French food. Italian wine

571
00:35:28,860 --> 00:35:32,500
are lasting much more than Italian

572
00:35:32,500 --> 00:35:36,260
wine are lasting much more than French wine. Because there has

573
00:35:36,260 --> 00:35:39,820
been a great variety, a great excitement, a great

574
00:35:40,620 --> 00:35:44,100
mix of all of the things that we are able to produce. We were lucky

575
00:35:44,100 --> 00:35:47,580
because by being invaded by everybody, everybody left something.

576
00:35:48,290 --> 00:35:51,690
I mean, I come from Sicily, and you have Arab influence, you have Roman

577
00:35:51,690 --> 00:35:54,930
influence, you have Greek influence, you have Spanish

578
00:35:54,930 --> 00:35:58,690
influence, French influence. And that goes not just in the

579
00:35:58,690 --> 00:36:02,450
dialect or in the language, it goes into the food. I

580
00:36:02,450 --> 00:36:06,170
mean, when I talk about Aglianico and Taurasi, that is a wine

581
00:36:06,170 --> 00:36:09,930
from Campania, you go back to the Greeks and the Romans

582
00:36:09,930 --> 00:36:13,650
that planted the first grapes. There is a beautiful history

583
00:36:13,650 --> 00:36:17,160
that go with the reality. The French pretty much

584
00:36:17,320 --> 00:36:20,840
were kind of cornered into the four great things. Burgundy,

585
00:36:20,840 --> 00:36:24,520
Bordeaux, Rhone and probably Epernay and Champagne.

586
00:36:24,920 --> 00:36:28,680
But they anything else is Vendepailly.

587
00:36:28,680 --> 00:36:32,360
It's kind of very ordinary. Instead, the Italians have been working

588
00:36:32,680 --> 00:36:36,040
thanks to their terroir, thanks to the evolution of technology

589
00:36:37,160 --> 00:36:40,600
into so much more. You know, the south was just

590
00:36:40,920 --> 00:36:44,480
south of Italy was a terrible area where you got the grapes and you

591
00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:48,320
shipped it, you know, to all of the crooked Negocians that were blending

592
00:36:48,320 --> 00:36:52,160
it, and then call it Soavi or call it Pinot Grigio, whatever.

593
00:36:52,400 --> 00:36:56,240
And now the new generation, the last 20, 25 years,

594
00:36:56,240 --> 00:36:59,560
with people like Angelo Gaia and so forth, says, no, no, no, we are going

595
00:36:59,560 --> 00:37:03,040
to make this wine worthy by cutting the

596
00:37:03,040 --> 00:37:06,400
hilt, by controlling much more,

597
00:37:06,880 --> 00:37:10,720
the whole fermentation process, and more than anything,

598
00:37:10,720 --> 00:37:14,370
trying to make wine that tastes good with food. And

599
00:37:14,370 --> 00:37:18,130
all of that has happened incredibly. And that's why there is the

600
00:37:18,130 --> 00:37:21,770
explosion of the Etna wine. Now Apulia is becoming

601
00:37:22,250 --> 00:37:25,810
more raising the bar, for sure, raising the bar. You know, the Amafi

602
00:37:25,810 --> 00:37:29,050
coast with the Alanico and so forth. So

603
00:37:29,450 --> 00:37:33,050
there has been the excitement of something not

604
00:37:33,050 --> 00:37:36,850
only new and pleasant and hard and pleasant

605
00:37:36,850 --> 00:37:40,090
to discover, but also easy on the pocketbook

606
00:37:40,730 --> 00:37:44,170
because, you know, yeah, if you want a trophy, you buy your chateau, you buy

607
00:37:44,570 --> 00:37:48,010
your. Your big Montrachet. But that is for

608
00:37:48,410 --> 00:37:51,770
a microscopic quantity of people, a

609
00:37:51,770 --> 00:37:55,610
microscopic segment of. Of the world. You know, the

610
00:37:55,610 --> 00:37:59,410
rest need good glass of wine. And that is what we have

611
00:37:59,410 --> 00:38:03,170
been good at. It's one of the things that's interesting. And I

612
00:38:03,170 --> 00:38:06,330
missed. I missed Trebekkiari this year. I don't know how.

613
00:38:07,390 --> 00:38:09,790
I don't know how I missed it, but it was maybe because of COVID I

614
00:38:09,790 --> 00:38:13,310
don't know. But I met Mr. Alois,

615
00:38:13,470 --> 00:38:16,990
which is a French name, but he's an Umbrian winemaker, and

616
00:38:16,990 --> 00:38:20,110
he's been apparently finding these old

617
00:38:20,110 --> 00:38:23,550
DNA vines, these old varietals that are

618
00:38:23,630 --> 00:38:27,230
purely Italian in Umbrian. I mean, what is 2000 wine grapes in

619
00:38:27,230 --> 00:38:30,990
Italy? And resurrecting some of these vines and producing,

620
00:38:31,310 --> 00:38:34,850
to me, amazing wines. And in my side of things, when I have to

621
00:38:34,930 --> 00:38:38,610
deal with the congestion of Groupon wines for $3

622
00:38:38,610 --> 00:38:42,410
and all the junk that's out there, and then I taste something as phenomenal

623
00:38:42,410 --> 00:38:46,210
as these things, how interesting they are. There's a couple of

624
00:38:46,210 --> 00:38:50,050
websites in the wine world, and I want your opinion of this, where

625
00:38:50,690 --> 00:38:54,250
they ask you five questions, maybe 10. Do you salt your

626
00:38:54,250 --> 00:38:57,410
food? Do you like raw mushrooms? Do you drink black coffee?

627
00:38:57,890 --> 00:39:01,650
And then supposedly they're creating some kind of palate for you

628
00:39:02,390 --> 00:39:05,350
based on their inventory of wines they can sell you. If you answer these questions

629
00:39:05,350 --> 00:39:09,150
one way, you're going to get certain wines. And the

630
00:39:09,150 --> 00:39:11,750
other day, a salesman came in and brought me one of these Umbrian,

631
00:39:13,110 --> 00:39:16,750
really volcanic. I forgot the grape. Well,

632
00:39:16,750 --> 00:39:20,310
it's either Sagrantino or Graechetto. If he's white, it might have been a

633
00:39:20,310 --> 00:39:23,430
griquetto. And it was amazing, right?

634
00:39:23,830 --> 00:39:27,350
And I said to myself, there's no way in the world

635
00:39:27,950 --> 00:39:31,150
that an algorithm or a test or a questionnaire

636
00:39:31,630 --> 00:39:35,430
can know that this wine exists for it to tell me I

637
00:39:35,430 --> 00:39:38,910
like it, right? And so we need somebody like a good psalm

638
00:39:39,390 --> 00:39:43,190
that's working the floor. That's that. That. In fact, the other day

639
00:39:43,190 --> 00:39:46,470
we were in Napa and we were at the French Laundry, and, you know, I

640
00:39:46,470 --> 00:39:50,190
know the list, but I wanted his opinion because he's

641
00:39:50,190 --> 00:39:53,430
tasted these things and he's ordered them and he understands them. And I said, this

642
00:39:53,430 --> 00:39:57,240
is where you know what the menu is and here's my budget, and

643
00:39:57,240 --> 00:40:00,880
I would like to be in the Cote Nuit in this particular meal. What do

644
00:40:00,880 --> 00:40:04,360
you have? And he produced an amazing wine. So in your

645
00:40:04,360 --> 00:40:07,840
restaurants, did you start out as a

646
00:40:07,840 --> 00:40:11,560
psalm? Yes, basically, yes. But at that time, we didn't have the

647
00:40:11,560 --> 00:40:15,400
whole process and so forth. But I've been always very involved with

648
00:40:15,400 --> 00:40:19,040
the SOMS program, and I've had a ton of sommelier in my

649
00:40:19,040 --> 00:40:22,810
life. Were they taste. Were you tasting things that came in the door?

650
00:40:22,810 --> 00:40:26,210
If. Wine warehouse, they started 72 also, actually. Exactly.

651
00:40:26,370 --> 00:40:30,170
If they came into the store, if Don Schliff came in and

652
00:40:30,170 --> 00:40:33,530
said, dan. Is a good friend. My salesman was Ray

653
00:40:33,530 --> 00:40:37,210
Featherstone. I still remember. I still remember the guy.

654
00:40:37,210 --> 00:40:40,850
Yeah. Well, the pork tasting I went to was Don's. Yes. And Don. Yeah, I

655
00:40:40,850 --> 00:40:44,610
was going to say Don comes to Drago almost every week.

656
00:40:45,330 --> 00:40:48,700
You say hi to him? Yes, yes. He's a good friend. Yeah. Yeah. He lives

657
00:40:48,700 --> 00:40:52,100
not too far from here. No, he lives in Glendale. Glendale, yeah. In fact, you

658
00:40:52,100 --> 00:40:55,500
know what he did before he became a wine guy? This. He was a sound

659
00:40:55,500 --> 00:40:59,260
guy. So I've invited him to come see my studio because

660
00:40:59,420 --> 00:41:02,700
this is what he really was, his career. But he. But

661
00:41:03,579 --> 00:41:05,420
as you know, he's known for his ports. But

662
00:41:07,500 --> 00:41:11,260
I remember. And I was working at the store then. But did

663
00:41:11,900 --> 00:41:15,490
Don come in array or the representative from Shallard or

664
00:41:15,490 --> 00:41:19,210
Bohemian Warren. Warren. Oh,

665
00:41:19,210 --> 00:41:22,970
I can't remember his last name. Did they taste you, or do you just

666
00:41:22,970 --> 00:41:26,770
say, well, we're going to put Mondavi Cab on here, and there's only Louis Martini,

667
00:41:26,770 --> 00:41:29,290
whatever, and we're going to put some went blanc de Blanc. Is that what. Is

668
00:41:29,290 --> 00:41:32,930
that what you did? Let's say that there were very, very few people that had

669
00:41:32,930 --> 00:41:36,690
a wine pallet because the salesman used to come with a book. That's it.

670
00:41:36,690 --> 00:41:40,450
Right. Give it to you and just say, what do you need? And then they

671
00:41:40,450 --> 00:41:44,010
had. The wine expert at Charlotte was Georges Chalimo.

672
00:41:45,060 --> 00:41:48,020
Ray Featherstone was for me at Winehouse and so forth.

673
00:41:49,460 --> 00:41:53,180
But these people, most of them either had

674
00:41:53,180 --> 00:41:56,900
the conversation with me because they were a little

675
00:41:56,900 --> 00:42:00,620
intimidated and a little respectful, or they gave me the

676
00:42:00,620 --> 00:42:04,460
book and he says, you know, teach me. So I had to

677
00:42:04,460 --> 00:42:08,100
do that, which I did with great pleasure, because I see

678
00:42:08,180 --> 00:42:11,990
now a lot of the people that have become major in the

679
00:42:11,990 --> 00:42:15,630
wine world. I'll give you an example. There

680
00:42:15,630 --> 00:42:19,230
is a young girl that started

681
00:42:19,230 --> 00:42:22,510
as a rookie at Young's Market, and now she's the general

682
00:42:22,510 --> 00:42:26,270
manager of Wilson and Daniels and their portfolio, which

683
00:42:26,270 --> 00:42:29,990
is spectacular. Her name is Anna Bui. Oh, I know her well. Yeah. And

684
00:42:29,990 --> 00:42:33,830
Anna's been. That's amazing. In the wine world for over 30

685
00:42:33,830 --> 00:42:37,630
years and is somebody that has grown into the position

686
00:42:37,790 --> 00:42:41,370
and into the knowledge of wine. And, you know,

687
00:42:41,370 --> 00:42:45,170
unfortunately, wine have become expensive. The wine

688
00:42:45,170 --> 00:42:48,770
critic kind of don't exist, because unless

689
00:42:48,770 --> 00:42:52,290
you offer wine, because you are the New York Times

690
00:42:52,930 --> 00:42:56,690
or the Wine Spectator, you know, on your own, you cannot do certain things.

691
00:42:57,170 --> 00:43:00,610
But overall, these were important people

692
00:43:00,690 --> 00:43:04,210
because they start understanding that that was the

693
00:43:04,210 --> 00:43:07,660
direction. As a matter of fact, Young's market now is

694
00:43:07,820 --> 00:43:11,260
so pro wine, Southern wine and spirit

695
00:43:11,660 --> 00:43:14,620
steals everything that there is to steal from everybody.

696
00:43:15,260 --> 00:43:18,940
Wine warehouse and so forth. You know, there is a sense

697
00:43:18,940 --> 00:43:22,460
that wine has become such an important part

698
00:43:22,940 --> 00:43:26,060
of the consumption of spirits.

699
00:43:26,620 --> 00:43:30,460
The consolidation. And these numbers may not be accurate,

700
00:43:30,460 --> 00:43:34,070
but that was told by them, by our mutual acquaintances.

701
00:43:34,310 --> 00:43:36,950
But there used to be, I think in America, 4,000

702
00:43:37,350 --> 00:43:40,910
wholesalers, and now there's like, 700, because, like you said,

703
00:43:40,910 --> 00:43:44,750
Southern's buying them up. The big fish have been there. Yeah. And I think

704
00:43:44,750 --> 00:43:47,430
that's a tragedy, but it's a. It's a reality because

705
00:43:48,390 --> 00:43:52,070
particularly during COVID it's very difficult to sell a bottle of

706
00:43:52,070 --> 00:43:55,870
wine. There's no on premise being sold anywhere. Almost, right? They're coming here now. People

707
00:43:55,870 --> 00:43:58,550
are coming here that would never come here.

708
00:43:59,770 --> 00:44:03,570
And I won't bring any names up, but they would never call me. And now

709
00:44:03,570 --> 00:44:07,170
I can't keep their wines in stock because there's no on premise buying

710
00:44:07,170 --> 00:44:10,490
anymore. And that's kind of good for us, I guess, but it's good for the

711
00:44:10,490 --> 00:44:14,330
consumer because they're buying online. But I think it's

712
00:44:14,649 --> 00:44:17,450
a travesty that these unique

713
00:44:18,090 --> 00:44:21,890
suppliers that were bringing in interesting wines, and in fact, the Burgundy I

714
00:44:21,890 --> 00:44:25,530
had at the French Laundry, I spun it around, see who brought it in.

715
00:44:26,060 --> 00:44:29,580
And then I needed to provide some nice Burgundy for a client,

716
00:44:30,060 --> 00:44:33,580
you know, four or five hundred dollars a bottle. And I. I'm not. You know,

717
00:44:33,580 --> 00:44:36,220
I taste a lot of wine, but I don't get to taste those very often.

718
00:44:36,620 --> 00:44:40,380
And I was. I was so impressed with this selection that I relied on his

719
00:44:40,380 --> 00:44:44,220
palate to find things in his inventory for my client, which he did, and

720
00:44:44,220 --> 00:44:46,220
it was a big success. But

721
00:44:48,940 --> 00:44:52,660
the way I look at wine now, this. The value of a good glass

722
00:44:52,660 --> 00:44:56,330
of wine and a good meal, and everybody

723
00:44:56,330 --> 00:45:00,130
has their level of where they want to participate, Right? Wine's

724
00:45:00,130 --> 00:45:03,930
a study. It never changes. I mean, you never run out of

725
00:45:03,930 --> 00:45:07,570
things to learn. You're still learning. Well, and you were

726
00:45:07,570 --> 00:45:10,930
talking about the gentleman from Umbria that is

727
00:45:10,930 --> 00:45:14,770
studying the vines and come with something

728
00:45:14,770 --> 00:45:18,250
else, you know, probably as you were talking about that, I was

729
00:45:18,250 --> 00:45:21,690
thinking at the mythical winemaker in Italy called

730
00:45:21,690 --> 00:45:24,930
Jesco Gravener. Have you ever heard of him? No. Okay.

731
00:45:25,170 --> 00:45:28,850
Josko was in the Slovenian part of Italy, which means

732
00:45:29,170 --> 00:45:32,850
Friuli, as the two hills. And he

733
00:45:32,850 --> 00:45:36,690
was probably the best white winemaker because

734
00:45:36,690 --> 00:45:40,529
Friuli, of course, is all Pinot and Chardonnay and so forth,

735
00:45:40,530 --> 00:45:43,490
cold weather stuff. And he decided, I want to go

736
00:45:43,490 --> 00:45:46,530
countercurrent completely. And he start making

737
00:45:47,090 --> 00:45:50,850
what somebody call orange wines. But most than that, he

738
00:45:50,850 --> 00:45:53,830
went to Georgia, bought all of those huge, huge

739
00:45:54,310 --> 00:45:57,830
amphora things. Amphora. And they start making this

740
00:45:57,910 --> 00:46:01,430
completely pure wine that became a big trend.

741
00:46:01,830 --> 00:46:05,550
And they are loved by the sommelier, loved

742
00:46:05,550 --> 00:46:08,390
by all of the people that want something that is completely

743
00:46:08,950 --> 00:46:12,790
natural, completely fresh, et cetera, et cetera. And

744
00:46:13,350 --> 00:46:17,030
he just said, I'm not making wine for the money. I'm

745
00:46:17,030 --> 00:46:20,630
making wine for the joy of being a

746
00:46:20,790 --> 00:46:24,620
trendsetter, of believing in, you

747
00:46:24,620 --> 00:46:28,340
know, in experimentation and things like that. You know, that

748
00:46:28,340 --> 00:46:32,140
for a while, orange wine was something loved by the sommelier

749
00:46:32,140 --> 00:46:35,940
because was a twist on what you

750
00:46:35,940 --> 00:46:39,740
do with white grape or what do you do with, you know, keeping

751
00:46:39,740 --> 00:46:43,380
the skin on and so forth, the process. Those are all things that

752
00:46:43,860 --> 00:46:47,540
are not the main trend, but they

753
00:46:47,540 --> 00:46:50,890
are part of why sommelier as to be

754
00:46:50,970 --> 00:46:54,690
enriched. And those are most things that happen

755
00:46:54,690 --> 00:46:58,370
in few restaurants, because few restaurants can afford the big

756
00:46:58,370 --> 00:47:02,130
wine list. Few restaurants can afford the sommelier. Few

757
00:47:02,130 --> 00:47:05,930
restaurants have the passion, because first of all, you have to

758
00:47:05,930 --> 00:47:09,730
have the passion. And that helps a little bit, you know, a little bank

759
00:47:09,730 --> 00:47:13,370
book to really have a solid wine program

760
00:47:13,530 --> 00:47:17,320
and a wine list. And at Drago Centro, we have

761
00:47:17,320 --> 00:47:21,160
an excellent, excellent sommelier right now. And

762
00:47:23,800 --> 00:47:27,440
when I started doing the inventory and so forth, I was surprised

763
00:47:27,440 --> 00:47:31,160
of all of this, Fraser, that is Piemontese

764
00:47:31,160 --> 00:47:34,520
varietals, that is hardly popular.

765
00:47:35,880 --> 00:47:39,640
A lot of the wine from Friuli, like Sciopettino,

766
00:47:40,040 --> 00:47:43,250
like Refosco.

767
00:47:43,730 --> 00:47:47,330
And I said, why you buy these things? Because they are

768
00:47:47,810 --> 00:47:51,330
something that goes very well with our food. It gave me the right

769
00:47:51,330 --> 00:47:54,930
answer. That makes me feel they have to be single

770
00:47:54,930 --> 00:47:58,730
ended, sold. But if you trust somebody like you did the guy of the

771
00:47:58,730 --> 00:48:02,290
French Laundry, then you will be pleasantly surprised.

772
00:48:02,450 --> 00:48:04,770
How you wouldn't have thought about a

773
00:48:06,210 --> 00:48:09,210
Sagrantino. You wouldn't have thought about a

774
00:48:09,210 --> 00:48:12,050
Sangiovese from Romagna. You wouldn't have thought about

775
00:48:13,760 --> 00:48:17,320
a wine from Georgia

776
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:21,040
or South Africa. You know, that's a. You made a

777
00:48:21,040 --> 00:48:24,880
couple of good points there. One, what a tough job,

778
00:48:25,040 --> 00:48:28,880
right? French Laundry. That was probably the easiest thing for him to

779
00:48:28,880 --> 00:48:31,120
do because I told him, I want to cote the nuit and I want something,

780
00:48:31,200 --> 00:48:34,120
you know, bold and. Cheeky to stay in the price point that you asked me.

781
00:48:34,120 --> 00:48:37,880
He knew what it was. But a good song, because there's probably good and bad

782
00:48:37,880 --> 00:48:40,750
ones, has to look at this customer and

783
00:48:41,870 --> 00:48:45,430
have a conversation with them if they're relying on it. Because you said, like you

784
00:48:45,430 --> 00:48:49,030
said, you're going to hand sell a Rafosco, you're going to hand sell a

785
00:48:49,030 --> 00:48:52,070
sagrantino. No one's going to look at the list and say, oh, I'd like a

786
00:48:52,070 --> 00:48:54,990
sagrantino, you know, which is a great grape. I think it's one of the great

787
00:48:54,990 --> 00:48:58,710
grapes of central Italy. But it takes a lot

788
00:48:58,710 --> 00:49:02,550
of passion. He's used the word passion on all spectrums of

789
00:49:02,550 --> 00:49:06,150
this business, from the food to the chef to the proprietor

790
00:49:06,310 --> 00:49:10,110
to the winemaker to the consumer. Has to have the passion, too.

791
00:49:10,110 --> 00:49:13,790
And I try to tell my customers, look, wine

792
00:49:13,790 --> 00:49:17,470
is a study, and you can take it as far as you want to take

793
00:49:17,470 --> 00:49:20,950
it, and you can learn as much as you want to learn. And I highlighted

794
00:49:20,950 --> 00:49:24,790
by Emmanuel Kamigi, who is a master psalm

795
00:49:24,790 --> 00:49:27,910
who makes wine. You probably know him. He's a good friend of Joe Akeem's, I

796
00:49:27,910 --> 00:49:31,350
guess. And he was in. We were talking, and he says, I was up seeing

797
00:49:31,350 --> 00:49:35,140
Darryl, you know, Cordy. And Daryl brings out an Armenian wine.

798
00:49:35,140 --> 00:49:38,940
I'm Armenian descent, and I can tell you, in 2006, when we

799
00:49:38,940 --> 00:49:42,740
went, they were bad. I mean, they're just undrinkable indigenously. Oh, we

800
00:49:42,740 --> 00:49:45,620
love them. And you have to. The Armenian pride says you have to tell them

801
00:49:45,620 --> 00:49:48,580
you really like them, but they're really bad. And now that

802
00:49:48,740 --> 00:49:52,580
technology's come and the terroir's been understood, the wines

803
00:49:52,580 --> 00:49:56,380
are much, much better. But Emmanuel, Emmanuel tastes his wine. He goes, these are pretty

804
00:49:56,380 --> 00:50:00,130
good. And. And then he says to me, now,

805
00:50:00,130 --> 00:50:03,490
as a psalm, I have to learn what these things are. I have to learn

806
00:50:03,490 --> 00:50:07,330
what Sirani is and Ani and Voskahat and these different grapes.

807
00:50:07,810 --> 00:50:11,530
But at the same time, as a winemaker in Purarat, I have to learn how

808
00:50:11,530 --> 00:50:15,290
to compete against them, because they're going to be reasonably priced, you

809
00:50:15,290 --> 00:50:18,930
know, particularly coming from Armenia. So I thought,

810
00:50:18,930 --> 00:50:22,690
okay, that takes that person's few

811
00:50:22,690 --> 00:50:25,450
and far between. I think there's a lot of people in this industry that have

812
00:50:25,450 --> 00:50:29,300
gotten into it, well, you know, already. Let's just take this example.

813
00:50:29,300 --> 00:50:31,820
If you want to work for youngs, you have to have a wit set. Whatever

814
00:50:31,820 --> 00:50:34,300
12 or 3 or something. Or you have to have some kind of

815
00:50:35,580 --> 00:50:38,940
courtesies level one or two. You have to have something

816
00:50:39,420 --> 00:50:42,460
to sell. The competition now is so big that

817
00:50:43,100 --> 00:50:46,900
I mean you cannot just bring a portfolio or just bring your little computer,

818
00:50:46,900 --> 00:50:49,980
iPad and just say what you want because there is no such a thing.

819
00:50:50,380 --> 00:50:54,060
And they have to be educators too. They do.

820
00:50:54,060 --> 00:50:57,900
Especially with the tremendous portfolio that these companies that we have

821
00:50:57,900 --> 00:51:01,720
been talking, talking about half, you know, but that's the. Sad part because

822
00:51:01,720 --> 00:51:05,440
like, and I'm not picking on Southern or youngster, but young's young, I would

823
00:51:05,440 --> 00:51:09,200
say does an incredible job. But they've got these books like this thing, you

824
00:51:09,200 --> 00:51:13,000
know. And the poor guy who's trying to

825
00:51:13,000 --> 00:51:16,600
make a dollar making wine in Napa doesn't get any

826
00:51:16,600 --> 00:51:20,160
presents because he, he can't send anybody to Hawaii or anybody to

827
00:51:20,160 --> 00:51:23,560
Italy for a free trip if they sell 10 cases. He can't afford that or

828
00:51:23,560 --> 00:51:27,400
she can't afford that. So that's why I think the travesty of these

829
00:51:27,400 --> 00:51:30,600
small importers and distributors going out of business or

830
00:51:30,600 --> 00:51:33,760
consolidating is because they can't get the presentation.

831
00:51:34,240 --> 00:51:37,520
And I think that's worse now in Covid. Absolutely.

832
00:51:37,520 --> 00:51:40,480
Restaurateurs. And it's going to be

833
00:51:41,360 --> 00:51:44,880
something that is not going to change anytime soon because

834
00:51:46,320 --> 00:51:49,840
there has been obviously a sloth on

835
00:51:49,840 --> 00:51:53,360
wine selling. Even if there is a lot of house consumption

836
00:51:54,050 --> 00:51:57,730
and there is a lot of wine to be moved. A lot of wine,

837
00:51:57,810 --> 00:52:01,490
we call it. In our terms, a lot of deals to be made. That's

838
00:52:01,490 --> 00:52:05,210
true. The poor gentleman

839
00:52:05,210 --> 00:52:08,570
came in yesterday. Okay. I felt really bad for the guy, but they asked me

840
00:52:08,570 --> 00:52:12,290
to be honest. And I taste Tuesdays. I tasted 9:30 to 2:00 clock

841
00:52:12,290 --> 00:52:15,970
every Tuesday, 75 to 100 wines. It doesn't matter. I'll taste whatever you bring.

842
00:52:16,050 --> 00:52:19,730
Okay. Like you probably have done. And he brings his Paso

843
00:52:19,730 --> 00:52:23,330
Robles blend. It was a God awful package,

844
00:52:23,570 --> 00:52:27,330
terrible package, like his child did it. It was a non vintage

845
00:52:27,330 --> 00:52:31,130
blend from Paso. And he wanted, I don't know, $11 a

846
00:52:31,130 --> 00:52:34,130
bottle or 10, something I can't remember, somewhere above a hundred dollars.

847
00:52:34,850 --> 00:52:37,570
And I said, I'm sorry, but in today's environment,

848
00:52:38,930 --> 00:52:42,410
you and I know that there are people who want to move some merchandise. They

849
00:52:42,410 --> 00:52:45,450
got to do that depletion because that other vintage is coming out of the tank

850
00:52:45,450 --> 00:52:47,570
and it's got to go into the bottle. And that bottle, the stuff on the

851
00:52:47,570 --> 00:52:49,510
warehouse floor has got to get out because I got to make room for the

852
00:52:49,740 --> 00:52:53,540
stuff in the tank. And that's what's happening right now, particularly since harvest just

853
00:52:53,540 --> 00:52:56,660
happened. And I, and I, I said, you want me to be honest, I'll be

854
00:52:56,660 --> 00:52:59,660
honest with you. I said, if you want me just tell you, hey, good luck

855
00:52:59,660 --> 00:53:02,620
with it. And then he said something that I think is going to annoy you.

856
00:53:03,100 --> 00:53:06,700
He said, well, it was non vintage. I forgot the

857
00:53:06,700 --> 00:53:10,460
grape mix and a really bad package. I said.

858
00:53:10,940 --> 00:53:14,580
He goes, well, it's doing very well at a certain restaurant by the

859
00:53:14,580 --> 00:53:18,170
glass at 12 or $15. I said, but the

860
00:53:18,170 --> 00:53:21,810
difference is with your. They're behind the screen pouring it,

861
00:53:21,890 --> 00:53:25,330
so the customer's not looking at the label and he doesn't know it's non

862
00:53:25,330 --> 00:53:29,130
vintage. And in today's environment, there's no reason really, in my, my

863
00:53:29,130 --> 00:53:32,969
opinion, to have a non vintage wine because there's so many great vintages

864
00:53:32,969 --> 00:53:36,650
out there to pour. And he's just, he just did not, didn't like

865
00:53:36,650 --> 00:53:40,170
that. But, you know, that's the, that's the reality of Tay's environment. And so it

866
00:53:40,170 --> 00:53:43,730
brings me to this question about what you're doing today at Drago.

867
00:53:44,220 --> 00:53:47,980
It's downtown. Yes. And I've been there many times. I don't

868
00:53:47,980 --> 00:53:51,180
remember. What are they doing with the COVID Is there, was there a patio? There's

869
00:53:51,180 --> 00:53:54,540
kind of a patio. There is a patio. There's a large patio. Yeah. It's

870
00:53:55,900 --> 00:53:59,740
enclosed in glass. And actually we have done

871
00:53:59,740 --> 00:54:03,580
very well with it because we are probably the only game in that part

872
00:54:03,580 --> 00:54:07,180
of the city that has this facility. And we are a little

873
00:54:07,180 --> 00:54:10,880
concerned because now, as you know, it's getting colder, but we

874
00:54:10,880 --> 00:54:13,600
have enough to cover. But you know, a good friend

875
00:54:14,560 --> 00:54:18,080
like Wolfenpack had to bring Spargo outside.

876
00:54:18,480 --> 00:54:22,000
Yeah. On the sidewalk. Beverly Hills. Yes.

877
00:54:22,000 --> 00:54:25,520
And they are going to have our time when it rains,

878
00:54:25,600 --> 00:54:29,240
when it's becoming really cold. So I don't know. We

879
00:54:29,240 --> 00:54:33,040
cannot survive the way they

880
00:54:33,040 --> 00:54:36,880
wanted to survive with just to go. To go may be good

881
00:54:36,880 --> 00:54:40,390
with certain people because of course, in the affluent community,

882
00:54:40,950 --> 00:54:44,390
but they are not gonna order wine because they have plenty of wine at home.

883
00:54:45,430 --> 00:54:49,030
Food doesn't travel. So the whole idea of

884
00:54:49,110 --> 00:54:52,870
great combination of food and wine like we've been talking about,

885
00:54:53,350 --> 00:54:57,150
it's right now numb. We hope that

886
00:54:57,150 --> 00:55:00,350
two, three months from now when hopefully we go back to a certain

887
00:55:00,350 --> 00:55:04,070
normality, we also go back to the normality of doing the things

888
00:55:04,070 --> 00:55:07,880
that we do best and propose the things that we

889
00:55:07,880 --> 00:55:11,680
know what to propose and to do. Well, my wife was reading

890
00:55:11,680 --> 00:55:15,520
today, she's very good about and she works here. She keeps me in Line,

891
00:55:15,520 --> 00:55:18,080
actually. And so. But she was reading today about

892
00:55:19,120 --> 00:55:22,800
some predictions for, for instance, Instacart, which is the shopping,

893
00:55:22,880 --> 00:55:26,600
you know, if you go to Whole Foods today, or Ralph's, particularly

894
00:55:26,600 --> 00:55:30,400
Whole Foods, the aisles are clogged with internal shoppers

895
00:55:30,810 --> 00:55:34,610
they're filling orders for online. And then I watched the Amazon truck pull

896
00:55:34,610 --> 00:55:38,010
up and they loaded all these bags in and that gentleman or woman is going

897
00:55:38,010 --> 00:55:41,290
to drive around and drop these foods off. And so now the market's full of

898
00:55:41,850 --> 00:55:45,530
virtual shoppers. Right? But she read that they

899
00:55:45,610 --> 00:55:49,450
predicting that that's going to drop, fall off the cliff as soon as

900
00:55:49,850 --> 00:55:53,450
this thing starts to free up. Because people want to get out, they want to

901
00:55:53,450 --> 00:55:56,570
do their own shopping and they're going to want to come to a restaurant. People

902
00:55:56,570 --> 00:56:00,410
are starving to go back to normality, do something. And going to a bar

903
00:56:00,900 --> 00:56:04,620
or a restaurant that was such an important part of people's

904
00:56:04,620 --> 00:56:08,260
life has been negated to them. But not just

905
00:56:08,260 --> 00:56:11,700
here, around the world, because as you know, we are stuck

906
00:56:12,180 --> 00:56:15,300
everywhere in the world, you know, with curfews and with

907
00:56:16,980 --> 00:56:20,100
super limitation and so forth. So all of that has to

908
00:56:20,820 --> 00:56:24,260
implode or explode because, you know, it can go on. Well,

909
00:56:25,540 --> 00:56:29,350
you nailed it on the head in that we know sitting

910
00:56:29,350 --> 00:56:32,510
here, the margins in your industry are brutally

911
00:56:32,830 --> 00:56:36,030
slim. They aren't any. And I read

912
00:56:36,590 --> 00:56:40,430
Soldner's book, Lutece, just finished it actually, and he even talks

913
00:56:40,430 --> 00:56:43,349
about and that you're Talking about the 60s and the 70s and the 80s, you

914
00:56:43,349 --> 00:56:47,030
know, the razor thin margins. Then too, though, as a chef, he was

915
00:56:47,030 --> 00:56:50,110
not concerned. He just, I'm going to buy this lamb and this

916
00:56:50,190 --> 00:56:53,990
sweetbreads because that's what I want to make. And it's up to my, the accountant

917
00:56:53,990 --> 00:56:56,020
to make sure I make some money. So

918
00:56:58,740 --> 00:57:02,580
how much different is this today when you look at the Drago

919
00:57:02,580 --> 00:57:06,020
books? It's worst. You know why it's worse? Why? Because

920
00:57:06,340 --> 00:57:10,020
everything has gone up like crazy and people are still very reticent

921
00:57:10,020 --> 00:57:13,700
to pay, let's say, $25 for certain

922
00:57:14,180 --> 00:57:17,940
entrees, $35 for finer

923
00:57:17,940 --> 00:57:21,590
things and so forth and so on. And they don't understand you're not paying

924
00:57:21,590 --> 00:57:25,270
what is in the dish. You are paying for the moment you walk

925
00:57:25,270 --> 00:57:29,110
in. You are paying for the fact that at 6 o' clock

926
00:57:29,110 --> 00:57:32,510
in the morning you had people making the bread,

927
00:57:32,830 --> 00:57:36,430
butchering and so forth. As we move on, there are

928
00:57:36,430 --> 00:57:40,150
so many departments and so forth before the

929
00:57:40,150 --> 00:57:43,470
big moment, when five o' clock comes and it's show time,

930
00:57:43,790 --> 00:57:47,350
all of that has included a lot of help. And

931
00:57:47,350 --> 00:57:51,190
employees and, you know, you know, the medical benefits and all of the

932
00:57:51,190 --> 00:57:54,350
things. The state of California doesn't help us that much. Right, right, right.

933
00:57:54,750 --> 00:57:57,870
Then you have to think about all of the deliveries.

934
00:57:58,510 --> 00:58:02,230
Look, they charge us $5 for every delivery that they make. Now, that's

935
00:58:02,230 --> 00:58:05,950
new. I mean, EPIC charged me five bucks. For what? And

936
00:58:06,030 --> 00:58:09,750
as we talk about deliveries, you know, you always have to single gas.

937
00:58:09,750 --> 00:58:13,070
With wine, you gotta be careful what you buy and the extent.

938
00:58:13,310 --> 00:58:16,350
But with food, you also have to make sure of

939
00:58:18,990 --> 00:58:22,750
spoilage and things like that. So did you do. Did you do

940
00:58:22,750 --> 00:58:26,590
food costing back in the 72? No. At that time, I didn't know where

941
00:58:26,590 --> 00:58:29,070
anything was. You just made the food and sold it.

942
00:58:30,350 --> 00:58:33,909
That time, everything was very easy. I mean, a vil

943
00:58:33,909 --> 00:58:37,670
scalopino was 5.95. I

944
00:58:37,670 --> 00:58:41,430
mean, veal, no less. Right. I remember the. Ruth Rachel

945
00:58:41,430 --> 00:58:45,270
says a complete meal was about $30. And, you

946
00:58:45,270 --> 00:58:49,050
know, it was so tremendously expensive. Wow, that's. Yeah, that felt like

947
00:58:49,050 --> 00:58:52,890
a lot of money. I used to buy a case of wine for, let's say,

948
00:58:52,890 --> 00:58:56,730
$100 not too long ago, and now that

949
00:58:56,730 --> 00:58:59,530
same case of wine is $1,000. Well, yeah.

950
00:59:00,410 --> 00:59:04,129
So that is related to where you were talking about margins. The

951
00:59:04,129 --> 00:59:07,970
margin have shrank because people have their idea

952
00:59:07,970 --> 00:59:11,690
of what they want to spend. They are very lucky, or

953
00:59:11,690 --> 00:59:15,190
we are very lucky to have a big

954
00:59:15,190 --> 00:59:18,430
outlet like Trader Joe that can show

955
00:59:18,670 --> 00:59:22,510
what wines can cost. Yes. So, of course. Of course

956
00:59:22,510 --> 00:59:26,270
your friend from. From Paso Robles

957
00:59:26,270 --> 00:59:29,790
should go to Trader Joe and just say, give me $2 a bottle.

958
00:59:30,029 --> 00:59:33,670
Try and get that sold. But, you know, the idea

959
00:59:33,670 --> 00:59:37,510
is there is a control about what

960
00:59:37,510 --> 00:59:40,910
people want to spend. And if they see that they can get a.

961
00:59:41,160 --> 00:59:44,520
They get a package of tortellini or whatever

962
00:59:44,840 --> 00:59:48,520
for $4.95, and then in a restaurant they cost $25.

963
00:59:48,760 --> 00:59:52,200
They don't connect to the fact that there are all of these other

964
00:59:52,200 --> 00:59:56,040
expenses, service and. Yes, and so that's a good question for the

965
00:59:56,040 --> 00:59:59,320
future. Maybe we don't have the answer to that. And it actually leads me to

966
00:59:59,320 --> 01:00:03,000
another question I had about that, particularly food and wine. And look at. I'm looking

967
01:00:03,000 --> 01:00:06,320
at your list. Wonderful sort of

968
01:00:06,320 --> 01:00:10,040
contemporary steakhouse in Hermosa beach or Manhattan beach called Arthur J.

969
01:00:10,120 --> 01:00:13,840
Yes. Great. We love. We love going there. It's a great vibe for us. It's

970
01:00:13,840 --> 01:00:16,960
my era, you know, it's my generation. But their list is

971
01:00:17,120 --> 01:00:20,720
fascinating because I looked at the list and I was talking to Sahm. I said,

972
01:00:20,720 --> 01:00:24,160
it looks like you have 75 vendors here. He Says, no, I have a hundred.

973
01:00:24,960 --> 01:00:28,640
And I'm like, wow. You know, is that not. And

974
01:00:28,960 --> 01:00:32,760
this is a question of a restaurateur. It's obvious when you walk into

975
01:00:32,760 --> 01:00:36,440
certain restaurants that that list was Southern Wines and Spirits. Put it together. Or

976
01:00:36,440 --> 01:00:40,150
Young's. Put that one together. Or one of the wholesalers. And we know that

977
01:00:40,230 --> 01:00:43,830
some restaurants, Southern will print your menu for you if you.

978
01:00:44,150 --> 01:00:47,670
Yes, populate with their wines. Those are not secret. So it's. It's

979
01:00:47,670 --> 01:00:51,310
reality. Yeah. So, but isn't it

980
01:00:51,310 --> 01:00:55,110
more expensive then to have to cut all these different checks, to.

981
01:00:55,110 --> 01:00:58,550
To receive all these different trucks, to. To see all these

982
01:00:58,630 --> 01:01:02,470
invoices go out and to taste these wines and to put them

983
01:01:02,470 --> 01:01:06,200
on the list? Isn't that just. Doesn't that make it. And I'm trying to predict

984
01:01:06,200 --> 01:01:09,880
the future a little bit. Are we going to see a consolidation in wine lists

985
01:01:09,880 --> 01:01:13,720
or we're going to. Hopefully remember in the evolution of the 50 years that

986
01:01:13,720 --> 01:01:17,480
I've been telling you about, you know, of the restaurant world and the growth

987
01:01:17,480 --> 01:01:21,160
of food and wine and so forth, the restaurants have

988
01:01:21,160 --> 01:01:24,760
gone toward the twist. There are no more mom and Papas. I opened my

989
01:01:24,760 --> 01:01:28,160
restaurant with $5,000 in 1972.

990
01:01:28,640 --> 01:01:32,440
Today, that same restaurant will probably be 3, 4 million

991
01:01:32,440 --> 01:01:35,890
dollars. Yeah, right. It'll be like 3, 4 million bucks. Wow. So

992
01:01:36,450 --> 01:01:39,970
in the late part of the 2000,

993
01:01:40,850 --> 01:01:44,610
more and more it became investors, became

994
01:01:44,770 --> 01:01:48,450
people that will put together shares and this

995
01:01:48,450 --> 01:01:52,210
and that. So it became just another industry on its own. Is a chef

996
01:01:52,210 --> 01:01:55,970
going to see any money? Celebrity chef and so forth. Maybe

997
01:01:56,290 --> 01:02:00,130
that little slice because of his presence and this

998
01:02:00,130 --> 01:02:03,630
and that. But overall, are the investors going to see

999
01:02:03,630 --> 01:02:07,390
money? If you are very lucky, one in a thousand, they

1000
01:02:07,390 --> 01:02:10,230
may. The rest, they just made the contribution.

1001
01:02:10,870 --> 01:02:14,390
Now with wines, they want to make sure

1002
01:02:14,390 --> 01:02:17,910
that the restaurants are at a certain level. Everybody

1003
01:02:17,910 --> 01:02:21,430
dreams to have a grand award from the wine spectators. So

1004
01:02:21,830 --> 01:02:25,190
they tell the investors, we have to invest money in the wine list.

1005
01:02:25,510 --> 01:02:29,280
And therefore, anything that is highly allocated,

1006
01:02:29,360 --> 01:02:32,920
they got to have it. Anything. That is the new

1007
01:02:32,920 --> 01:02:36,160
trend. Used to be Alvaro Palacios. Used to be

1008
01:02:37,920 --> 01:02:40,400
any of the scheming

1009
01:02:41,200 --> 01:02:44,920
Cabernet Pinot Noir and so forth. You got a heavy. Yeah. In the Super

1010
01:02:44,920 --> 01:02:48,560
Tuscan and the Sasikaya and so forth. So little

1011
01:02:48,560 --> 01:02:51,680
by little, if they have one or two

1012
01:02:51,920 --> 01:02:55,680
otrisomelia in the premises, they got to have the tools and

1013
01:02:55,680 --> 01:02:59,400
they got to give them the tools. Then remember, on the other side, you

1014
01:02:59,400 --> 01:03:02,920
have this company that I think I have five

1015
01:03:03,000 --> 01:03:06,800
salesmen just for Southern Wine and Spirit. Yeah. One is a wine specialist, one

1016
01:03:06,800 --> 01:03:10,279
is just fine wine specialist and this and that. And

1017
01:03:11,000 --> 01:03:14,680
with me, doesn't work because they know better. But if they find

1018
01:03:14,840 --> 01:03:18,600
the right predator, you know, hey, I

1019
01:03:18,600 --> 01:03:22,120
want to have it because I want to have a prestigious list. Because, because, because.

1020
01:03:22,870 --> 01:03:25,670
And you amass

1021
01:03:26,310 --> 01:03:30,150
wines that sometimes you're not going to sell, but they look good, they

1022
01:03:30,150 --> 01:03:33,830
look pompous, they look whatever. Then remember,

1023
01:03:33,830 --> 01:03:37,590
there is a ton of deals. That's what's happening right now. Exactly. I

1024
01:03:37,590 --> 01:03:41,310
was going to say, call Southern youngsters and just say, just tell me

1025
01:03:41,310 --> 01:03:43,790
your deals, don't tell me, and so forth. And you know, what would be the

1026
01:03:43,790 --> 01:03:47,470
answer? Anything is a deal. What do you want? So they are saying

1027
01:03:47,470 --> 01:03:51,320
that make a. Difference in a way. Remember, it's like real estate is

1028
01:03:51,800 --> 01:03:55,560
right now a buyer market. You know, if you have

1029
01:03:55,560 --> 01:03:59,160
the money, just buy good values, because these

1030
01:03:59,160 --> 01:04:02,880
values eventually are going to go up. You know, I laugh when I look

1031
01:04:02,880 --> 01:04:06,600
at Opus One because slowly I've seen Opus One going

1032
01:04:06,600 --> 01:04:10,200
Now to about 240, 250 a bottle, and for a while was

1033
01:04:10,200 --> 01:04:14,000
allocated and so forth. And then lately, I'm

1034
01:04:14,000 --> 01:04:17,600
listening, how much Opus One do you

1035
01:04:17,600 --> 01:04:21,390
want? And is. You know, that's a problem. Well, that's. But

1036
01:04:21,710 --> 01:04:25,390
I've talked to a lot of wineries and winemakers and wholesalers

1037
01:04:25,390 --> 01:04:29,070
and. And I. I asked that question because some of them will

1038
01:04:29,070 --> 01:04:32,830
tell you 80% on premise or 80% restaurant

1039
01:04:32,830 --> 01:04:36,510
poor. Right. And that's gone. Right. So now we only had 20%

1040
01:04:36,510 --> 01:04:40,150
retail. That's why I'm seeing these guys. That's why Mike Salachi at Opus would was

1041
01:04:40,150 --> 01:04:43,630
on my podcast, is because even though they only make 25,000

1042
01:04:43,630 --> 01:04:47,290
cases, it's not as easy to sell today. No. Remember,

1043
01:04:47,370 --> 01:04:50,930
there were a lot of prestigious wine that were for

1044
01:04:50,930 --> 01:04:54,530
restaurant only. Now that doesn't exist. Now. You just.

1045
01:04:54,530 --> 01:04:57,290
Silver Oak came here. Camus. I can't keep Camus in stock.

1046
01:04:58,490 --> 01:05:00,770
We're getting on an hour and I don't want to take all your time. And

1047
01:05:00,770 --> 01:05:03,370
I want to do this again because we have so much to talk about. That's

1048
01:05:03,370 --> 01:05:04,490
fine. But

1049
01:05:06,970 --> 01:05:10,690
when we travel, I only use the Michelin

1050
01:05:10,690 --> 01:05:14,380
guide because there is internal

1051
01:05:14,380 --> 01:05:18,220
ratings. You know, there's the people that are comparing things, and I can't

1052
01:05:18,220 --> 01:05:21,780
stand the Yelps and the Four Squares and all these crazy apps because

1053
01:05:21,940 --> 01:05:25,220
I don't know what that other person thinks of food in general, where they've been,

1054
01:05:25,220 --> 01:05:28,900
how they've experienced food. And so their experience may be different than mine,

1055
01:05:28,900 --> 01:05:32,580
but how important is it for a restaurant? A for

1056
01:05:32,580 --> 01:05:36,340
Michelin, which is just came to LA this year, I think. Yeah, but

1057
01:05:36,580 --> 01:05:40,420
it won't go anywhere because they need to sell books and LA and

1058
01:05:40,420 --> 01:05:44,080
nobody cares. And plus in all fairness, we you don't have three

1059
01:05:44,080 --> 01:05:47,280
star restaurants. You know, restaurants like

1060
01:05:47,280 --> 01:05:49,200
Providence get close to that.

1061
01:05:51,040 --> 01:05:54,800
Meliss used to get close to that. But look here,

1062
01:05:54,800 --> 01:05:58,640
you got to do volume to survive. You got to do numbers. You got to

1063
01:05:58,640 --> 01:06:02,400
do what is possible. Because to do

1064
01:06:02,400 --> 01:06:05,280
a 25 covers

1065
01:06:06,000 --> 01:06:09,760
at whatever level is it doesn't work. The French

1066
01:06:09,760 --> 01:06:13,440
Laundry is probably the only exception I know that still is

1067
01:06:13,440 --> 01:06:17,260
able to get away with 6, 700 a person.

1068
01:06:17,340 --> 01:06:20,860
We had to go there at 4:30 in the afternoon. And you paid the

1069
01:06:20,860 --> 01:06:24,500
fortune, right? Yeah, we did it for the experience. Right. But we had the only

1070
01:06:24,500 --> 01:06:27,900
time. This is once. I mean it was amazing that the 430 slot was even

1071
01:06:27,900 --> 01:06:31,700
open. But the fact that you can't get in at prime time, forget

1072
01:06:31,700 --> 01:06:35,140
it. Yeah. So what's good? And we're wrapping this up because it's a Covid thing

1073
01:06:35,140 --> 01:06:38,900
and I want people to, to understand the economics because the

1074
01:06:38,900 --> 01:06:42,440
real estate sign, you brought it up. If I own a building like let's say

1075
01:06:42,440 --> 01:06:45,720
where Celestino's is and let's say Celestino's didn't have any,

1076
01:06:46,200 --> 01:06:49,760
any courtyard to work with as they do today and they couldn't use the

1077
01:06:49,760 --> 01:06:53,400
sidewalk. And I find this tragic to a certain extent because it's random.

1078
01:06:53,560 --> 01:06:57,240
If you're live in a city that doesn't allow you to use

1079
01:06:57,240 --> 01:07:00,960
the street like Colorado Boulevard. They allowed Sierra Madre. They

1080
01:07:00,960 --> 01:07:04,720
allowed. Yeah, but look, downtown you have homeless instead of. Right. And

1081
01:07:04,720 --> 01:07:08,350
then you can't do that. Right, right. So you have almost no chance to

1082
01:07:08,350 --> 01:07:11,750
survive all this unless you have a ton of money. Right. Or the investors in

1083
01:07:11,750 --> 01:07:15,350
your part are willing to continue. And so now what happens to the

1084
01:07:15,350 --> 01:07:18,990
landlord? The landlord can't put another restaurant in there because

1085
01:07:18,990 --> 01:07:22,230
it's already equipped and everything. And you've got the clarifying tanks and all that equipment

1086
01:07:22,230 --> 01:07:25,150
and all that money. The three to four million dollars it takes to start one

1087
01:07:26,030 --> 01:07:29,830
is kind of worthless. You know, the salvage value restaurant equipment is like that

1088
01:07:29,830 --> 01:07:33,580
much. So he or she, the owner has to

1089
01:07:34,620 --> 01:07:37,820
backfill them with something and they're not going to get the rent. They're not going

1090
01:07:37,820 --> 01:07:40,140
to get the three or five or eight dollars a foot they were getting from

1091
01:07:40,140 --> 01:07:43,700
the restaurant when it was busy. And so it seems like this trickled up

1092
01:07:43,700 --> 01:07:47,420
effect that's going to somewhere end up on somebody's plate

1093
01:07:47,979 --> 01:07:51,820
that we can't afford to have these restaurants go out

1094
01:07:51,820 --> 01:07:55,380
of business. We have to do something. And so what does a new restaurant look

1095
01:07:55,380 --> 01:07:57,340
like? What would a new restaurant.

1096
01:07:59,590 --> 01:08:03,430
There will be less and less fine dining, that's for sure. Because of the cost.

1097
01:08:03,590 --> 01:08:07,270
Because of the cost. There will be less and less

1098
01:08:07,350 --> 01:08:10,950
super talented people that because they want to have

1099
01:08:10,950 --> 01:08:14,750
two stars, let alone three stars from Michelin, will go out

1100
01:08:14,750 --> 01:08:18,350
of their way to buy the best of China, the best of this, the best

1101
01:08:18,350 --> 01:08:22,070
of that and so forth. Because at the most you can do

1102
01:08:22,070 --> 01:08:25,290
25 covers a night when you do it. And

1103
01:08:25,290 --> 01:08:28,090
economically means that you lose your shirt every single day.

1104
01:08:29,290 --> 01:08:32,570
So right now we know that once

1105
01:08:32,890 --> 01:08:36,610
Covid is finished, two, three months, four months from now, whenever

1106
01:08:36,610 --> 01:08:40,290
God finally say that's it, we

1107
01:08:40,290 --> 01:08:43,970
are going to have a blood bath of

1108
01:08:43,970 --> 01:08:47,210
restaurant closure and other businesses. I think so

1109
01:08:47,210 --> 01:08:50,410
50%. 50%. Because all of these people

1110
01:08:51,160 --> 01:08:54,960
either don't find a landlord that is flexible and say, you

1111
01:08:54,960 --> 01:08:58,720
know, pay me what you want, pay me 50% and so forth. A

1112
01:08:58,720 --> 01:09:02,520
lot of this restaurant cannot do it with just to go because,

1113
01:09:03,480 --> 01:09:06,600
you know, they still got to open the restaurant, they still got to bring cooks,

1114
01:09:06,600 --> 01:09:10,240
they still got to bring food, they still got to do everything. And if the

1115
01:09:10,240 --> 01:09:13,960
phone doesn't ring and. And then you have Jordache or whatever

1116
01:09:13,960 --> 01:09:17,609
that want 20% or 30%, they all think right now

1117
01:09:17,609 --> 01:09:21,289
is so up in the air and so confusing. Yeah, that's the problem.

1118
01:09:21,449 --> 01:09:24,969
And it's not going to get any better because restaurants,

1119
01:09:25,529 --> 01:09:29,369
certain restaurants especially that have a certain dimension are

1120
01:09:29,369 --> 01:09:33,129
looking at Christmas almost like the department store. It's a time to

1121
01:09:33,129 --> 01:09:36,409
have the Christmas party, to have you can't do it. And people

1122
01:09:36,569 --> 01:09:40,089
finally will splurge and drink and so forth. None of that is not going to

1123
01:09:40,089 --> 01:09:43,289
happen. Yeah. So we will get to February, March

1124
01:09:43,860 --> 01:09:47,380
with scratching our head. Who has been able to survive?

1125
01:09:47,780 --> 01:09:51,540
Who has been able to say, okay,

1126
01:09:51,860 --> 01:09:55,420
now let's start again. And let's start again. It will be very interesting

1127
01:09:55,420 --> 01:09:59,060
because very few restaurants, as I say, can have

1128
01:09:59,459 --> 01:10:02,820
the high end approach to fine dining.

1129
01:10:02,980 --> 01:10:06,700
Look more and more when you read or when you hear it's

1130
01:10:06,700 --> 01:10:10,500
Mexican restaurants all over. Food costs are low, food

1131
01:10:10,500 --> 01:10:14,050
costs are low. Or kind of ethnic restaurant

1132
01:10:14,450 --> 01:10:18,210
where they with tight situation,

1133
01:10:18,770 --> 01:10:22,290
you know, they do what they got to do with wine is a little bit

1134
01:10:22,290 --> 01:10:26,130
better because sooner or later these wines have to move.

1135
01:10:26,450 --> 01:10:29,410
So they are not perishable like it is food. And so that's right.

1136
01:10:30,290 --> 01:10:34,050
Most of the wine company, as you know, have furlough most of the employees.

1137
01:10:34,370 --> 01:10:37,890
So when the time comes, they bring them back. So it's a different

1138
01:10:37,890 --> 01:10:41,680
dynamic. And remember, these are big, big fish that we talk

1139
01:10:41,680 --> 01:10:45,520
about. That's right. So they can kind of absorb. Well, thousands of

1140
01:10:45,520 --> 01:10:49,360
reps are out of board. Exactly. Thousands. Yeah. And so

1141
01:10:49,360 --> 01:10:52,440
there is this whole dynamic that we are all, you know, we don't have a

1142
01:10:52,440 --> 01:10:56,200
crystal ball about this, just like we didn't have a crystal ball about COVID No,

1143
01:10:56,280 --> 01:11:00,040
we are victim in this situation of

1144
01:11:00,280 --> 01:11:03,880
where things are going well. The spirit and the

1145
01:11:03,880 --> 01:11:07,000
passion it takes to be in this business is going to be what survives and

1146
01:11:07,000 --> 01:11:10,820
somebody will, will come out of this and do something. My daughter is a

1147
01:11:10,820 --> 01:11:14,620
French trained boulanger and she was in New York and her,

1148
01:11:14,700 --> 01:11:18,380
her chef, Jonathan Benno, had just earned a Michelin star

1149
01:11:18,380 --> 01:11:21,500
at his namesake restaurant called Benno. And

1150
01:11:22,060 --> 01:11:25,660
Yeah, it was Alando Cast restaurant. Yeah. Before it closed.

1151
01:11:25,820 --> 01:11:29,620
Yes. Alan closed quite a few years. It won't open again. No. And so she

1152
01:11:29,620 --> 01:11:33,420
lost, she lost her job. She was also baking for his trattoria, which

1153
01:11:33,420 --> 01:11:37,220
was inside the Hotel Evelyn. Then a little bakery. But now she's

1154
01:11:37,780 --> 01:11:41,500
for much less money. But I was interested

1155
01:11:41,500 --> 01:11:44,580
to hear this. Young, I think she's Australian woman,

1156
01:11:45,220 --> 01:11:48,980
opened a little cafe near her neighborhood. She lives near upper Manhattan

1157
01:11:49,380 --> 01:11:53,020
and it's called Manhattan Village. And she walks to work,

1158
01:11:53,020 --> 01:11:55,420
she gets there at three in the morning and she does all the baking and

1159
01:11:55,420 --> 01:11:58,820
the pastries and stuff. She revamped the whole program and

1160
01:11:59,380 --> 01:12:03,100
I'm really proud that she ate. That's the passion it takes. Right.

1161
01:12:03,100 --> 01:12:06,850
She took a huge pay cut, but she, she still has the drive to

1162
01:12:06,850 --> 01:12:10,690
get up three in the morning, walk down the street and turn

1163
01:12:10,690 --> 01:12:14,330
on the ovens and start to bake. But think about what are the alternative?

1164
01:12:14,490 --> 01:12:17,930
What are the other option? Yeah, that's the question. Exactly.

1165
01:12:18,250 --> 01:12:21,650
So she will be waiting for sunnier days when

1166
01:12:21,650 --> 01:12:25,330
eventually all of the talent will be paid by a

1167
01:12:25,330 --> 01:12:29,010
good job, a good offer, et cetera, et cetera. And you know,

1168
01:12:29,010 --> 01:12:32,680
related to what you just say about neighborhood, more and

1169
01:12:32,680 --> 01:12:36,400
more people have discovered the neighborhood, you know, just like in Italy,

1170
01:12:36,400 --> 01:12:39,680
just like in France and so forth. You don't have to go to the west

1171
01:12:39,680 --> 01:12:43,480
side to go to a big restaurant or a great restaurant and so forth. Beside

1172
01:12:43,480 --> 01:12:47,160
the fact that there are less and less special occasion restaurants. Yes. You

1173
01:12:47,160 --> 01:12:51,000
know, you want to, you want to have a good pizza, you know

1174
01:12:51,000 --> 01:12:54,760
where to go. You want to have good Mexican food. My

1175
01:12:54,760 --> 01:12:58,480
gosh, everywhere. Same thing with every other

1176
01:12:58,480 --> 01:13:01,920
thing. And also have to say, the bar of

1177
01:13:01,920 --> 01:13:05,600
quality has raised a great deal. Products are

1178
01:13:05,600 --> 01:13:09,360
Better techniques are better. Baking is better

1179
01:13:09,360 --> 01:13:12,400
than ever. So there are all of these things where.

1180
01:13:12,880 --> 01:13:16,560
Yeah. Are they going to make money? Hardly. But at least

1181
01:13:16,960 --> 01:13:20,480
they will get by until things get better. As you know,

1182
01:13:20,640 --> 01:13:24,320
these are not businesses where you make a fortune. No.

1183
01:13:24,560 --> 01:13:28,280
And I think that's misunderstood by the public. Right. They

1184
01:13:28,280 --> 01:13:31,080
see these restaurants that are packed with people, and at the end of the day,

1185
01:13:31,080 --> 01:13:34,680
you're making 5% if you're lucky. And also they come on

1186
01:13:34,680 --> 01:13:38,480
Saturday night at prime time. They don't come on a Monday night when you

1187
01:13:38,480 --> 01:13:41,360
kind of say, what do I do now? Yeah, what am I doing? Right. So

1188
01:13:41,440 --> 01:13:44,680
I want your opinion on one last thing, and then I'll let you go. My

1189
01:13:44,680 --> 01:13:48,480
father started two chapters of Les Amie Devant back in the 70s, when

1190
01:13:48,800 --> 01:13:52,160
the judgment of Paris and all that stuff was happening and wines were becoming famous,

1191
01:13:52,370 --> 01:13:55,490
or I guess in Italian, GLI amici divino. Yeah.

1192
01:13:56,210 --> 01:13:59,170
Yes. And I want to bring it back. And

1193
01:13:59,890 --> 01:14:02,730
when I was talking to Mr. Spurrier about this, he said, you must bring it

1194
01:14:02,730 --> 01:14:06,490
back. Of course, he started Academy Divan, so he's, you know, partial to the

1195
01:14:06,490 --> 01:14:10,290
idea. But I'm sort of thinking with the. With food

1196
01:14:10,290 --> 01:14:13,930
and wine, with the barrage and the congestion and the mixed

1197
01:14:13,930 --> 01:14:17,650
messaging, particularly in the wine business on the street, that it's time

1198
01:14:17,650 --> 01:14:21,360
to sort of have an informal association you can join. It

1199
01:14:21,360 --> 01:14:24,880
doesn't cost anything. And I don't know what it looks like yet, because back in

1200
01:14:24,880 --> 01:14:28,720
the 70s, you had Nathan Cromen come and Robert Bowser and even

1201
01:14:28,720 --> 01:14:32,440
Robert Mondavi came down a couple times and spoke for my dad's group. But

1202
01:14:32,440 --> 01:14:36,120
that. That was different. And it's two things on this. I think

1203
01:14:36,360 --> 01:14:40,160
wineries are ready to do that again. You know, there was a period

1204
01:14:40,160 --> 01:14:43,800
there for the. In the 90s and the early 2000s, where now we don't have

1205
01:14:43,800 --> 01:14:47,500
the manpower to put on shows and put on dinners. But I think

1206
01:14:47,500 --> 01:14:51,060
they're ready to do it again, just from the response I've been getting.

1207
01:14:51,380 --> 01:14:54,980
But do you think it's time to do that, to have

1208
01:14:55,060 --> 01:14:58,820
Piero come in and we'll do a wine and food pairing? I'll open

1209
01:14:58,820 --> 01:15:02,180
the warehouse out, I'll put a bunch of chairs, we'll pour some wines, we'll have

1210
01:15:02,180 --> 01:15:05,980
a conversation, we'll do a presentation, or we have to do

1211
01:15:05,980 --> 01:15:09,540
a zoom call. And my point is, I think

1212
01:15:09,540 --> 01:15:13,380
it's time to start re educating the consumer

1213
01:15:13,960 --> 01:15:17,560
on what's going on. All these wonderful wines from these little districts of

1214
01:15:17,560 --> 01:15:21,400
Italy, all these wonderful wines from Napa that are coming out that need

1215
01:15:22,360 --> 01:15:25,560
presentation because they're not getting it at the restaurants.

1216
01:15:26,280 --> 01:15:29,400
You think people would. Think people would respond to that? I think

1217
01:15:30,040 --> 01:15:33,720
there are restaurants that are already doing it. I went to a

1218
01:15:33,720 --> 01:15:37,480
champagne event Monday night at the restaurant called

1219
01:15:37,480 --> 01:15:40,180
Marino. There is Amaroz. And

1220
01:15:41,380 --> 01:15:45,180
the whole idea was, we'll charge you a

1221
01:15:45,180 --> 01:15:48,980
very nice meal with truffles and you bring as much champagne as you want.

1222
01:15:48,980 --> 01:15:52,580
Really? That's great. You won't believe the Krug and

1223
01:15:52,580 --> 01:15:54,420
the dp.

1224
01:15:56,340 --> 01:15:59,860
Everything was there. It was an affluent group.

1225
01:16:00,100 --> 01:16:03,780
But when you say bring champagne and champagne goes with everything,

1226
01:16:04,500 --> 01:16:07,700
I couldn't believe that in this tiny restaurant that was a little

1227
01:16:08,300 --> 01:16:11,860
about the size of this room, there were about 60 people. That's really fun.

1228
01:16:11,860 --> 01:16:15,700
Yeah. Obviously an inspector would have closed them because

1229
01:16:15,700 --> 01:16:19,380
of distance. But you know, what I'm saying

1230
01:16:19,380 --> 01:16:23,100
with your question is. Yes, it's time again

1231
01:16:23,819 --> 01:16:27,380
now that we have the technology with zoom and so forth. Although I still

1232
01:16:27,380 --> 01:16:30,900
believe in this, I still believe in the human part because I

1233
01:16:30,900 --> 01:16:34,470
appreciate, you know, they wanted me to taste some Brunello's

1234
01:16:34,790 --> 01:16:37,750
via Zoom. And I say, come on, you know.

1235
01:16:38,550 --> 01:16:42,350
That'S almost an insult. Exactly. We have to go back to reality. We have

1236
01:16:42,350 --> 01:16:46,030
to go back to the fact that wine is something that you

1237
01:16:46,030 --> 01:16:49,750
have to romance, but then it's in the

1238
01:16:49,750 --> 01:16:53,550
palate. So you have to start kind of understanding

1239
01:16:53,550 --> 01:16:57,230
what you sip. Yes. You know, I always love to say, you can go like

1240
01:16:57,230 --> 01:17:00,750
this and drink wine, or you can dissect

1241
01:17:00,750 --> 01:17:04,430
wine. And there are so many beautiful words that then you use

1242
01:17:04,430 --> 01:17:07,470
with aromatics, with, you know,

1243
01:17:07,710 --> 01:17:11,550
swirling and so forth. And it's a poetry,

1244
01:17:11,630 --> 01:17:14,750
it's. It's exciting. There are so many things.

1245
01:17:15,070 --> 01:17:18,910
Obviously it's not for everybody, but I'm always amazed, especially

1246
01:17:18,910 --> 01:17:22,630
with women, how many neophyte you have in the world of

1247
01:17:22,630 --> 01:17:26,190
wine. And I am very positive that once

1248
01:17:26,830 --> 01:17:29,950
this period again will be behind us.

1249
01:17:30,750 --> 01:17:34,350
It's not going to be business as usual, it'll be ideas,

1250
01:17:34,350 --> 01:17:37,990
it'll be creativity. It will be how we are going to market and

1251
01:17:37,990 --> 01:17:41,670
merchandise all of these things. So wine groups are going to

1252
01:17:41,670 --> 01:17:45,470
become more and more an important part. And

1253
01:17:45,470 --> 01:17:49,270
restaurants have to be smart enough to attract them. Which is one of

1254
01:17:49,270 --> 01:17:53,050
the things that I proposed when I went to Drago. I said, we are going

1255
01:17:53,050 --> 01:17:56,730
to be a wine restaurant. We are going to have every wine

1256
01:17:56,730 --> 01:18:00,290
group possible. The people that want to spend just so much

1257
01:18:00,370 --> 01:18:04,210
because this is their budget, or the people that want to have this much because

1258
01:18:04,210 --> 01:18:07,970
they really want to go all out and let's face it, we have another Thing

1259
01:18:07,970 --> 01:18:11,730
that we haven't touched on the restaurant side, people now

1260
01:18:11,810 --> 01:18:15,530
have deep cellar and bring their own wine to restaurants a lot. So

1261
01:18:15,530 --> 01:18:19,090
I was very, very. Of course, you know, with the wine list like

1262
01:18:19,410 --> 01:18:22,950
ours, you kind of say this is an insult, et cetera. But more and

1263
01:18:22,950 --> 01:18:26,790
more, I take wine to restaurant. I understand.

1264
01:18:27,030 --> 01:18:30,510
That's interesting. You know, I understand I'd rather pay $30

1265
01:18:30,510 --> 01:18:33,750
corkage with fine riddle glasses and so forth

1266
01:18:33,990 --> 01:18:37,670
than the hundred dollars that a bottle of wine

1267
01:18:37,670 --> 01:18:41,390
will cost me in a restaurant. I agree with that. There's two

1268
01:18:41,390 --> 01:18:45,230
schools of thought. And talk about the education part.

1269
01:18:45,230 --> 01:18:48,470
First, when we went to the French Laundry and we were in Napa, obviously,

1270
01:18:49,090 --> 01:18:52,810
and my group that was with me were primarily Napa Cab. Their sellers

1271
01:18:52,810 --> 01:18:56,370
have Napa Cab. And they were fascinated.

1272
01:18:56,610 --> 01:18:58,850
And my friends laugh at me because I use that word all the time, but

1273
01:18:58,850 --> 01:19:02,690
they were fascinated by this Burgundy. And so I thought, aha. You know, I got

1274
01:19:02,690 --> 01:19:06,130
to move the needle a little bit on exploring new things. And this leads me

1275
01:19:06,130 --> 01:19:09,930
to that conversation. You're just talking about the restaurant

1276
01:19:09,930 --> 01:19:13,690
on Union. Union. The Italian restaurant on Union. I think

1277
01:19:13,690 --> 01:19:17,470
they have a wonderful short list. They have a great list. And my thought

1278
01:19:17,470 --> 01:19:21,230
process when I go to a place like that is okay as long as I

1279
01:19:21,230 --> 01:19:24,710
know that the psalm and the chef had gotten together and decided what

1280
01:19:25,270 --> 01:19:28,350
wines they were going to put on the list because of what they're serving. And

1281
01:19:28,350 --> 01:19:31,910
I respect that. I kind of want to take a wine from their

1282
01:19:31,910 --> 01:19:35,590
list. I kind of want to see what they were thinking and pay the little

1283
01:19:35,590 --> 01:19:39,390
extra money. But I'm like you. I find myself where I would

1284
01:19:39,390 --> 01:19:42,710
have been embarrassed five years ago, 10 years ago, to walk in with a bottle

1285
01:19:42,710 --> 01:19:46,470
of wine. It just. We just do it now. I

1286
01:19:46,470 --> 01:19:50,230
feel like drinking this tonight. The only insult is when I

1287
01:19:50,230 --> 01:19:53,910
see that they went to Trader Joe across the street, got a wine,

1288
01:19:53,910 --> 01:19:57,630
and bring it. And, you know, sometimes. Because lately I became a

1289
01:19:57,630 --> 01:20:00,750
little blatant, you know, because, you know, certain things were annoying.

1290
01:20:01,150 --> 01:20:04,870
It's like, I'm gonna charge you three times in corkage what

1291
01:20:04,870 --> 01:20:08,550
you pay for this wine. I know. Now, if you're doing it for the. No,

1292
01:20:08,550 --> 01:20:12,050
that's a problem. I think you're right. If you're doing it to save the buck,

1293
01:20:12,450 --> 01:20:15,730
that's different. If you're doing it because you feel like something

1294
01:20:16,130 --> 01:20:18,250
that you have in your cellar and you're not sure if they have it at

1295
01:20:18,250 --> 01:20:21,610
the list in Valentino, you know, that's different. But if you're just doing it across

1296
01:20:21,610 --> 01:20:24,730
the street, look, I don't Want to take any more time? We're on an hour

1297
01:20:24,730 --> 01:20:28,490
and 20 minutes. Piero, it's been a huge pleasure having you here

1298
01:20:28,490 --> 01:20:32,210
and to hear the history. And we have more subjects to touch

1299
01:20:32,210 --> 01:20:34,930
on the next time we get to have you in the studio,

1300
01:20:36,180 --> 01:20:40,020
but I hope to see a Drago soon. We're big fans. Are

1301
01:20:40,020 --> 01:20:43,460
you there every night? Almost, yeah. That's my life. My life is the

1302
01:20:43,460 --> 01:20:46,580
restaurant business. And now that I kind of pretty much,

1303
01:20:47,140 --> 01:20:50,620
you know, I was in Houston, I was in Vegas, big time. I had three

1304
01:20:50,620 --> 01:20:54,220
or four restaurants here in town. Just an amazing energy level. Now I

1305
01:20:54,220 --> 01:20:57,900
am. I'm just the. What do you call

1306
01:20:57,900 --> 01:21:01,490
it? The twilight of my career. Well, that's.

1307
01:21:01,640 --> 01:21:05,440
It's a huge influence. Picked a restaurant that was very serious about

1308
01:21:05,440 --> 01:21:08,880
food, about wine. Celestino Drago is a fantastic

1309
01:21:08,880 --> 01:21:12,520
chef. So we have all of the tools. Right now, we are empty, kind

1310
01:21:12,520 --> 01:21:15,800
of. Yes. But we are ready for the big.

1311
01:21:16,440 --> 01:21:20,040
We're coming, we're coming. In fact, Joachim

1312
01:21:20,120 --> 01:21:23,960
owes me dinner, so maybe I'll drag him over there. Joachim

1313
01:21:23,960 --> 01:21:27,640
is in France or is here. No, he came back. He came back. He's an

1314
01:21:27,640 --> 01:21:31,080
old, old friend. We had dinner at Hippo the other night. Oh, good.

1315
01:21:31,960 --> 01:21:35,560
He did my daughter's wedding. My daughter, the friend, the boulanger,

1316
01:21:36,120 --> 01:21:39,920
she got married in January. And oddly, because she. My

1317
01:21:39,920 --> 01:21:43,560
wife's like, don't do January because we're just coming out of

1318
01:21:43,560 --> 01:21:46,120
December here, which is our busiest month. And now you're going to make me put

1319
01:21:46,120 --> 01:21:49,480
on a wedding for you. And my wife's like, put it in March.

1320
01:21:49,720 --> 01:21:52,600
That would have been Covid. Right. So we did. In January,

1321
01:21:53,400 --> 01:21:57,190
Joaquim brought his whole crew from Patina. And I

1322
01:21:57,190 --> 01:22:00,910
don't know how you. I really don't know how you boil 200, you know, poach

1323
01:22:00,910 --> 01:22:04,750
200 eggs to make, you know, salad, frise. He used to do. Used

1324
01:22:04,750 --> 01:22:08,470
to do the. The Grammys. Used to do so many different things for

1325
01:22:08,470 --> 01:22:12,070
thousand, two thousand people. He was there. He's well organized. He's

1326
01:22:12,070 --> 01:22:15,790
very German that way. And by the way, he's another dear friend, and we

1327
01:22:15,790 --> 01:22:19,270
didn't talk about him. And he's unfair because as far as

1328
01:22:20,070 --> 01:22:23,750
French goes, he had nothing but great French

1329
01:22:23,750 --> 01:22:27,500
chef that came out of his school. And they are all

1330
01:22:27,500 --> 01:22:31,300
over the. All over South California. Let's just touch on

1331
01:22:31,300 --> 01:22:35,060
that for a second. When we were talking and I had him on the podcast,

1332
01:22:35,060 --> 01:22:38,700
he was one of my first shows, actually. Years. Last year, two years ago,

1333
01:22:38,700 --> 01:22:42,340
he was talking about his experience in Nice and how he bounced around In

1334
01:22:42,340 --> 01:22:46,020
France a little bit, and then came to America with his crew to

1335
01:22:46,020 --> 01:22:49,780
what, the thing. Club. Yes, whatever. The club

1336
01:22:49,780 --> 01:22:53,500
was downtown. But one of the comments

1337
01:22:53,500 --> 01:22:56,660
that he made, and I asked this question all the time. I didn't ask you.

1338
01:22:56,660 --> 01:23:00,460
I'm going to ask you now. And that is, he

1339
01:23:00,460 --> 01:23:03,540
would go down to the farmer's market at Nice and buy the thing, and he

1340
01:23:03,540 --> 01:23:06,739
would go to the port and buy the fish and the shellfish.

1341
01:23:07,060 --> 01:23:10,900
And so this idea of nouvelle cuisine really wasn't that new. It was just the

1342
01:23:10,900 --> 01:23:14,140
way you did business in that part of the world. And we come to

1343
01:23:14,140 --> 01:23:17,870
California, and we're coming off of frozen steaks

1344
01:23:17,870 --> 01:23:21,670
from Salisbury, steak from, you know, Swanson's. And here comes this.

1345
01:23:21,750 --> 01:23:25,590
This idea to. To cook food from seasonal ingredients.

1346
01:23:26,390 --> 01:23:29,070
And so I asked him this question. I said, okay, you and I go to

1347
01:23:29,070 --> 01:23:32,789
Santa Monica Chef's Market on Wednesday, and

1348
01:23:32,789 --> 01:23:36,510
I buy all organic, and you buy all conventional. And

1349
01:23:36,510 --> 01:23:40,230
we back to the kitchen and we prepare them. All things, all variables, equal

1350
01:23:40,550 --> 01:23:44,170
processing temperatures, serving everything. Which one tastes

1351
01:23:44,170 --> 01:23:47,690
better? It's a question.

1352
01:23:48,490 --> 01:23:52,010
I know it's a complex

1353
01:23:52,010 --> 01:23:55,690
question. Let's say that there

1354
01:23:55,690 --> 01:23:59,209
is a feeling, first of all, to go through every

1355
01:23:59,210 --> 01:24:01,770
step, so picking the product,

1356
01:24:02,650 --> 01:24:04,970
smelling the product, choosing the product,

1357
01:24:07,290 --> 01:24:11,060
paying a little bit more, because, you know, all of the. At least

1358
01:24:11,060 --> 01:24:14,780
for me, when I see that a farmer's come from Santa Lucia or from wherever,

1359
01:24:14,940 --> 01:24:18,660
you kind of expect almost, you know, that he made an extra effort

1360
01:24:18,660 --> 01:24:22,420
and so forth, then, of course, you are in the hand of somebody

1361
01:24:22,420 --> 01:24:26,100
that knows what to do with this product. Yes. So, you know, it's

1362
01:24:26,100 --> 01:24:29,500
always going to be, look, if you go to

1363
01:24:29,820 --> 01:24:33,420
a restaurant, you don't know where the product comes

1364
01:24:33,420 --> 01:24:37,220
from. Right. But if you have gone through the passage and you know that

1365
01:24:37,220 --> 01:24:39,580
there are some of these chefs that are very, very

1366
01:24:40,550 --> 01:24:44,310
committed to the Wednesday farmers market, to having,

1367
01:24:44,390 --> 01:24:48,230
you know, connection with then. Then there has to be a difference. I

1368
01:24:48,230 --> 01:24:50,790
think that's the. I think that's it. I think you're right. I think it's the

1369
01:24:50,790 --> 01:24:54,510
passion of the farmer paired with the passion of the chef and their

1370
01:24:54,510 --> 01:24:58,350
relationships. Why. Why will they pay more for a

1371
01:24:58,350 --> 01:25:00,390
product? Why will they go

1372
01:25:02,230 --> 01:25:05,830
in Santa Monica from Monrovia, you know what I mean? Instead of getting,

1373
01:25:06,580 --> 01:25:10,180
yeah, just call. Yeah, just call and say, bring me

1374
01:25:10,260 --> 01:25:14,100
10 cases of tomato, whatever. You know, thank you

1375
01:25:14,100 --> 01:25:17,940
again. Murdoch Club. I was just thinking the Murdoch Club. Yeah, yeah, that's

1376
01:25:17,940 --> 01:25:21,220
it. That's right. We'll reconvene

1377
01:25:22,020 --> 01:25:25,780
and do this again, and we'll. We'll peel back the McCartys

1378
01:25:25,780 --> 01:25:29,580
and the Waxmans and the the Franks and the and the chefs that worked in

1379
01:25:29,580 --> 01:25:33,300
your places. I think that'd be a great conversation for the people to hear.

1380
01:25:33,670 --> 01:25:36,910
And so thank you again for coming and thank you for your time. And we

1381
01:25:36,910 --> 01:25:39,670
will see you at Drago's. I'll buy off the list, too.

1382
01:25:40,230 --> 01:25:40,870
Cheers.

1383
01:25:48,950 --> 01:25:52,790
Thank you for listening to Wine Talks with Paul Calum. Karin. Don't forget to subscribe

1384
01:25:52,790 --> 01:25:56,550
because there's more great interviews on their way. And of course, all

1385
01:25:56,550 --> 01:26:00,310
these podcasts are sponsored by the original Wine of the Month Club, 48 years

1386
01:26:00,310 --> 01:26:02,470
in business. Don't forget to visit our website,

1387
01:26:02,630 --> 01:26:06,330
wineofthemonthclub.com Folks, have a great time

1388
01:26:06,330 --> 01:26:08,530
out there in the wine world. Cheers.