OPINON: Royal Wine Service?

By Frank Ebbinghaus - last revision: 26.08.26

StuartPigott.com loves strong opinions when they are well argued, and this clearly falls into that category.

A restaurant in the centre of Berlin like no other in Germany’s capital. Crisp white tablecloths and serviettes with an elegantly casual atmosphere that’s remeniscent of Paris. And the cuisine - wonderful steaks and seafood dishes - fits this perfectly. In Grill Royal the guest is king, every evening it’s packed and the density of famous guests is high. The waiting staff flatter the guests with contemporary Berlin charm, creating the impression that the motto of the house is abandon your tightfistedness all ye who enter...and splurge! Then, the gates of Paradise on Earth open for you. Of course, there’s also a comprehensive wine list. And sommeliers.

My last visit to Grill Royal was on a hot Monday in July and as we arrived the restraurant was steadily filling. We ordered food, and quickly found something in the bible-like wine list: a white Sancerre from Domaine Vacheron. "Just a moment, I’ll get the sommeliére," the friendly waitress replied. It seemed a bit bureauchratic, but we got our wine. With the main course we wanted a half bottle of red wine. I hesitated, unsure whether to take one of three red Bordeauxs or a 2015 Brunello di Montalcino. The sommeliére  - note that I'm not talking about Nancy Großmann - recommended the Brunello, because on this hot day the wine’s freshness would pair with the red meat we’d ordered particularly well. I don’t know the wines of Tuscany that well, but her argument sounded convincing. 

When she served a taste of the wine I encountered a powerful red that was already mature, but beneath the pleasureless exterior there was an interesting liveliness. I suggested she give the wine as much air as possible when decanting it, and the adventure seemed to end well…at the cost of 150 Euro for the half-bottle. But actually it ended only half-well, because it was only with the last drops from the last glass that the wine revealed its greatness. But why must a guest have to explain to a sommeliere how to get the best out of such a bottle? So, I asked her if she’d ever tasted the wine before. She replied that she’d never tasted the 2015 before, but had tried the 2018 vintage from a full-sized bottle. The 2018 vintage in Tuscany was much cooler than 2015, but she didn’t seem to realize that this would result in a very different flavour profile. And she didn’t taste the wine before she served it to us?

An exception? Certainly not. I already had a string of similar problems at this famous restaurant: a completely oxidized 8-9 year old Riesling Großes Gewächs from the the Mittelrhein region, and a no less oxidized 25 year old red from a famous producer in the Northern Rhône/France. And, the cream on the cake, an over the hill Château Margaux from a lesser vintage was served although it was obviously corked. Our cautious question about this serious problem was cheekily answered by the sommelier with the words,  „oh sorry, I don’t have a good nose for corky wines.“ As if it’s OK that a professional wine expert can’t identify corky wines! Perhaps he should have sent the dishwasher to our table instead…

A couple of months before, the same sommelier sat next to me at the table of the famous Mosel winemaker Ernst Loosen when several great French wines were served. The devotion with which this young man tasted an excellent white Bordeaux made it clear he has a genuine passion for wine. Why didn’t he show that to us when we were guests at Grill Royal? Because it’s just a job for him? Or because he thinks we’re stupid enough to drink and pay for faulty wines? 

Because of these experiences I avoided Grill Royal for several years. When I returned I realized that the problem is not that a couple of sommeliers there are disinterested, rather the situation there is symptomatic for high-end restraurants in general. One of the secrets of Grill Royal is that every guest feels welcome, regardless whether they’re a film director or a nobody who wants to treat themself. Everyone is warmly recieved,and you certainly don’t have to drink wine. You can drink cola, beer, cocktails, long drinks or water, like a famous film director did when I was last there. No problem! But, I saw no wine bottles on the tables around my own, only a number of guests drinking wine by the glass. However, everyone seemed to be in a good mood, and the atmosphere was very hospitable.

The fat wine list is certainly a challenge, and for some guests it’s just too much. How easily wine lists of this kind create feelings of uncertainty or anxiety, and the appearance of a sommelier at the table can make the situation worse! Even when sommeliers are friendly and sensitive they’re figures of authority, who can spread a sense of discomfort. Guests can easily feel they’ve been put on the spot, or are made to feel inferior. Recently we were all confronted with a mass of health warnings regarding even the smallest consumption of alcohol. Under these circumstances the mere presence of a wine list on the table can stumulate a passive-aggressive mood. And so, somms can become defensive, turning any discussion about the choice of wine into a minefield. This is particularly true of insecure young sommeliers.

Ducking their responsibilities in order to placate every guest leads to a loss of motivation and the erosion of their backbone. Every sommelier should have a backbone, but a flexible one so that they can elegantly steer the guest in the direction of a wine choice that he or she percieves as being entirely their own. Then, both sides are on eye level. Ideally, sommeliers should be connsoisseurs of people, and know what the guests want to drink before they’re sure of it themsleves. They know their task is to make guests happy with the choice of wine, and this demands not only wine knowledge, but a certain maturity, and an unshakable empathy for the guest. Good sommeliers develope an aura that dissolves anxiety.

In practical terms, this means that even guests with no wine knowledge should feel pleasure when the sommelier comes to their table, because the sommelier's conviction that the first sip will be delightful is palpable. And, of course the wine ordered must come to the table in ideal shape.  Dodgy bottles should never make it to the table. This demands that the somm taste the wine first, decant it if necessary, or in extremis suggest that another wine would do the job better. Respect and humility are the necessary companions of backbone.

And this isn’t just a theory, because I’ve experienced sommeliers and sommeliéres with these noble qualities, most notably Melanie Wagner of Schwarter Adler in Vogtsburg-Oberbergen/Baden, Stéphane Gass of Schwarzwaldstuben in Baiersbronn/Schwarzwald plus Steve Hartzsch and Billy Wagner of Nobelhart & Schmutzig in Berlin. Each of them does this in their own way, one discretely listening , the other louder and more direct, but always sensitive and committed to the guests. And these are only the most obvious examples of honourable sommeliers.

The problem is that for a while - a period that already ended - it was as cool to become a somm as an influencer. And so a bunch of young people drifted into this profession that dodn’t realize that serving the guest should go without saying, and that having backbone doesn’t mean preaching. And that’s why they sometimes close themselves up when a guest derides the „rough stuff“ from the Jura/France or isn’t convinced by „extremely radical“ orange wines. In a Berlin two Michelin star restaurant a young somm once told me that he couldn’t stand behind the wine list, because he hadn’t written it. Then the chief sommelier watched disinterestedly from a distance as his poor younger colleague struggled without success to help us pick a red wine.

Is Berlin just too cool for real devotion and alteruistic sommelier and sommeliere passion? Today few of them really seem interested in serving the guest. Sad.

PS I will retrun to Grill Royal, because it’s too beautiful not to. However, I will play safe when ordering the wine.