What is the job of a beverage manager in an F&B establishment. There was a time when a bartender and a sommelier handled two different sections of the restaurant.
Today, knowledge of just one section of the salon isn’t enough to make a full-blown career out it. As the world of fine beverages has expanded, the need for knowledge that is more comprehensive has become the need of the hour.
Cliches aside, that is precisely what a sommelier needs to groom themselves for today. They need to know their wines but also their whiskies, beers and non-alcoholic beverages. Be it serving up an aperitif of pairing one with food, the job description of a sommelier goes much beyond knowing the appellations of Western Europe.
Which is precisely what me along with the team behind the Indian Sommelier Championship (ISC) set out to find: We rounded up the top beverage professionals in three metros — some of them even came in from other cities to be a part of the exercise — and set them up with masterclasses in beverages conducted by the best in the trade. Through these sessions the participants were able to groom their service and knowledge quotients in every aspects of beverages — from pouring the perfect pint to identifying the ingredients in a cocktail and even guessing the grapes in a wine.
On the third day, an exam was conducted to find the cream of the crop in each city. These six were rounded up and flown into Delhi for the grand finals. An entire day was dedicated to grilling and quizzing these top finalists in front of a live jury comprising professionals and stalwarts from the Indian F&B fraternity, ranging from brewers to professors, importers, mixologists and publishers. Between these five, they marked the contestants independently and the scores were tabulated and vetted in a formal manner. Later in the evening, the results were announced over a gala dinner at The Pullman New Delhi Aerocity, where the dress theme was black, white and sneakers (in an effort to draw attention to World Mental Health Day, which was just a day prior, and a subject that is much ignored in the hospitality field.) Noble cause aside, it made for a pretty mix, the team of people all turned out in their regalia but sporting sneakers underneath it all.
The winner of the ISC 2019 was the young lady, Anushka Pandkar, who has recently joined the ITC Grand Maratha in Mumbai. This is the second year overall (and in a row) that the title trophy was lifted by a female participant. The second place went to Ravi Batra, also from ITC (but ITC Maurya New Delhi) followed by Gaurav Dixit of The Leela Chanakyapuri in third place.
Barring Anushka, who was here for the first time, the other two had been podium finishers in earlier editions of the ISC. Between the three, they won prizes to visit vineyards and make their owns blends of brews with senior luminaries in the trade.
The next year, the competition will return and, we are promised, in an even bigger format. Although the competition says ‘sommelier’, but the hunt is more about the comprehensive beverage master. Because, in the end, the world is too big and life is too short to live by one beverage alone.
The writer is a sommelier
