Becoming a Master Sommelier: The Exam episode 1

It's about 12 hours until I'm taking the exam. You're either prepared or you're not, you know. That's an interesting thing. It's like, you know, the test is already written. I've already studied. I'm probably not going to learn any questions that's going to make or break it, you know. Service is a whole different animal, you know, tasting, you know, depending. If I get a good night's sleep, it might affect it, but I'll be in bed by midnight. I don't taste till 11. Wake up at 8 30, go for a run, light run, drink much water, have a glass of wine, maybe a half glass of wine, high acid before. But you know what? I'm not going to do anything different. I'm having a glass of wine, cooking dinner. I'm going to wake up and take it. You taste tomorrow morning? You taste? Yeah. This test is spread out over three days or no? Yeah, three days. Yeah, so you taste first? Yep. Is that the hardest part? I think so. You know, I do tasting Tuesday. I do service Wednesday, theory Thursday, and then Thursday at three o'clock the results happen. I take my blind tasting exam in about two hours and I'm a little bit nervous, but I feel pretty calm. It's a little bit surreal, but it's here. You know, it came a little faster than I thought. Both my nostrils are clear. It's just a high acid Sauvignon Blanc. It's a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc just to cleanse my palate from my cliff bar and just kind of get some wine on my palate. I'm here for the master's exam. Are we supposed to wait in the restaurant? Do you know? The restaurant is right there on the right hand side. Okay. Thanks. How's it going, Ian? John McCune. Good to see you. What's up, buddy? Nice to meet you. Hey, you all right? Yeah, I'm good. I'm about to go in. Good. I don't know about you, but well, let's talk about it. We will. Out of my presence. Yeah, exactly. Absolutely. Take care. Yeah, have fun. It's always a tough part. You get to see people done. They're all stoked, you know, and you said you'd go nuts. You know, if you came out of it looking like a depressed mess, like, man, those wines were messed up. Then I feel a little bit more nervous, which is the worst part about seeing anybody. I really wish I could just be in my own little cocoon and then walk in there, but you just, it's inevitable that you're going to cross paths with the other candidates. It's a little colder than I'd like. I mean, the wine's probably gonna be pretty chilly, but they're sitting in this weather and this temperature. We've got umbrellas for days. So we'll be setting the room up. I'll come back down and get you in a second. Okay. I think I could have done it. I changed a few of the wines in the last second, but I think it was a good thing. But I think wine six was Chianti, but it had so much that sawdust and, but it had to have been Rioja. I'm so glad that's done. Jesus. I think I went, I think, I think I felt pretty good about five of them, you know, and I called, I felt pretty good. And I changed two at the last moment. I initially called Chateauneuf-du-Pape number six, and it had too much of this like coconut hair, intense spiciness, like, like dirty vanilla, kind of, uh, reminding me of Rioja, but I wanted to call it Chateauneuf, but I wanted to call it Chianti, but it just had too much of this, like chewing on the edge of a coconut, you know, but, uh, and then wine two. So I changed it to Rioja 04 Reserva. And then wine, uh, two, what happened? Oh, I, I was all confused about it. It was like, is it Chablis? Is it Albarino? Is it Gruner Veltliner? Is it, is it, you know, what are these unoaked, uh, old, old varieties? And, um, it ended up, I called it Pinot Grigio Alte Adige. And I always make this make, I went back to it and I smelled all this peaches and I was like, this is Albarino. So I called it Albarino, which I think it was, but we'll see. But I feel like, I feel like, I feel like I got, I nailed the wines, but I always think that until somebody tells me you got one for six and then, uh, and then it's a whole different game. But, uh, I think I have a shot. I honestly think I have a shot. I think I should probably go review service, huh? If I pass this, this tasting, it's huge, huge. And I felt really, I feel really good. I feel like, uh, I feel like I'm in the 70 to 80 range. You know, I think I probably, I five out of six, I think I felt pretty good at five out of six of I feel like I knew what they were. You know, one of the things with being a sommelier and becoming a master sommelier is being able to polish glasses, you know, open bottles and essentially being able to blind taste. So that's what we're going to do here for Ian. And what we're going to blind, is he in the room? He's not around, is he? So we're going to do here is a, it's an 86, La Mission, Oberon. I think he could, uh, possibly get it confused for maybe possibly usually has six wines for the lineup. In this case, we'll just give them one, something with maturity. Do you want me to go through the whole four minutes? Wine one is a red wine. The wine is, uh, medium clear. The wine is bright. There's no evidence of gas refloculation. The glass one is a dark ruby center consistent to an orange rim. Uh, there's quite a bit of, uh, of a brick, uh, of a light brick color on the rim. Touch of staining of the tears. The wine is a medium plus concentration of color. The wine's clean. The wine is Venice. Wine is medium plus intensity of aromas. Aromas coming out dominated by dark currents, um, underwrite blackberry, uh, underwrite blackberry and raspberry, boysenberry, fresh violet. There's a lot of, uh, dried tobacco leaf, red tobacco leaf, uh, lead pencil, kind of a roasted earth side, roasted hillside, excuse me. There's cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg, and baking spices. Give me evidence of quite a, quite a bit of American oak. Now going back to, I still have some sediment in the glass, excuse me, on the site, on the palate. Wine is dry. Medium plus body. Fruits on the palate confirm the nose. Lots of dark current. Roasted raspberry, roasted black plum. Florals coming through of a, kind of a, a dried herb characteristic. Fresh violets, actually dried violets, excuse me. Earth coming through of ground gravel, dried clay, and a touch of, uh, dried limestone. Confirming cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg, um, on the palate. Confirming high evidence of, uh, new French oak. Barrels. City is medium plus. Alcohol is medium plus. Complexity is very high. Tannin is medium plus. Length is long. Wine is in balance. This wine is really good. Thank you for bringing this. Uh, initial conclusion. This wine is from the old world, from a warm climate. Possible grape varieties include Sangiovese or possibly a Cabernet Sauvignon dominated blend with Merlot from the left bank or a Merlot dominated blend from the right bank. This wine is 15 to 25 years old from France or Italy. Final conclusion. Tannins, man, they're a little bit more intense. It reminds me of Brunello and Bordeaux. I'm going, this wine is from the old world. This one is from Italy. This one is from Tuscany. This one is from Brunello de Montalcino from the 1994 vintage. Uh, from, I'm going to say the 1990 vintage from a high quality producer Sangiovese dominated blend. That's it. There you go. And he was wrong. So I think as a, as kind of initial critique on the nose, you said American oak. I meant French. But you said American. I said French. You said American on the nose. Are you sure? In the palate. I thought I said it French. You said American on the nose and French in the palate. Damn, that's, that's crazy. As an initial critique. I thought it was, I know I meant to say French. 95 left bank or something. It's an older, it's an A6. Wow. Beautiful wine. Incredible wine. I really said American oak on the nose. Yeah. Who knows what I said today at the test. You know, that's the crazy part. Cause I thought I said it French. Yeah. Like I swear, I swear I would, I know there's a camera, but I would bet that, uh, that I said French there's cinnamon, vanilla and nutmeg and baking spices. Give me evidence of quite a, quite a bit of American oak. But, um, it's funny. No, but the whole time I was like Bordeaux, Bordeaux. And then I usually get confused by old Manila and then that Tannin. And, um, you know, I made it what I wanted it to be rather than trusting the whole time. I was like left bank. I was in St. Julianne or, or it's a, it's really good. It's a tight vintage and it still has plenty of years ahead of it. So it's a good 86. Great questioning. Good wine. It's absolutely fantastic. Herbsaint or absinthe, rinse the glass, a sugar cube, a few dashes of Angostura bitters, two ounces of rye whiskey, gin, lemon juice, Cointreau gin with lemon juice, lime juice and sugar with cream, egg white, orange flower water and club soda, vodka, Kahlua and a cream, vodka, Kahlua and cream. I take the test in 20 minutes, taking the practical exam, which is a mock service with three tables. One is champagne service. One is food and wine pairing. And one is a Bordeaux decanting and cocktails are asked, blind spirits, smelling, uh, spirits without being able to taste them. Let's get up there. So we have two sides of the room. I will take Robert, Ian and John. Very simple checklist of tools. Can you not record this please? Yeah, I just did the practical exam and, uh, I think it went well. I don't feel terribly confident about how it went, but, um, I didn't mess up terribly bad at any one station. You know, my maitre d, uh, Jay Fletcher, you know, took the glasses off the table and he put them back on the Gerda and he said, you know, basically they're dirty because I didn't use the steam properly, which I didn't know there was steam in this, you know, in vessel over to the right. And so it was obviously my fault. And I apologized to the table, my apologies for the dirty glasses. And then I went and polished them. And this is in the middle of, you know, a timed, um, service. So, you know, I don't really feel too confident about the whole exam, to tell you the truth. You know, the more I think about tasting, the more I think about, I mean, service, I think I maybe passed, but not, I don't think I, uh, I don't think I crushed it. You know, there was a couple of questions that I messed up on. So I feel like, you know, so, so about both. I'm going to do about five hours of review tonight and about two or three hours of review tomorrow morning. And, uh, hopefully I prepared correctly, you know, tomorrow I'm taking the theory portion of the master cell me examination. So I'm just trying to review every flashcard I have, you know, over the next three or four hours and wake up and do it again for the next, you know, from six to 10 tomorrow morning and going to take the test at 10, 10. And, you know, hopefully they ask me questions. I know there's a lot of people that won't even take this exam and they don't want to try because they don't get it. But once you put your hand in the ring, you better study. I like the P I like people to try. I, cause I think it inspires things. And I think that the pursuit of knowledge is great. Study till midnight tonight, sleep six hours tonight. Cause I've already slept plenty today and then wake up at six in the morning, have coffee, go for a run, come back and do flashcards for three or four hours and just review stuff that's already in my brain. But, you know, just, just focus on, you know, making sure that I can access the information, you know, but you know, I've never taken this exam before, so I think it's just going to be a, I don't know. I think it's, you know, this whole thing is humbling. I mean, to see the level of nerves and, you know, the chances of coming out passing nothing are, you know, pretty intense. You know, there's, it's a chance that you could come out passing no parts, which is, you know, I think for many people, when you dedicate something, you know, when you dedicate your life to something and, you know, you go in and you take a test and you don't pass anything. I think, I think it's a, it's just a, it's an intense thought, like that you could put so much of your life into something and you come out and have passed nothing, which I hope doesn't happen, but it's definitely a possibility. All right, go to bed. 257 grams for Benaztrite, even 306 grams for section Grenoble. Bessalet is the region, Agnolos, Rapsani, and also Messinicola is another one. Stromadora? What is that? Stromadora is north of Lisboa. No, no, it's east. It's in the eastern border close to Portugal. Not really. What is the, what are the subs of the Maipo? This is it. I'm going to take the test. Let's see. Take a deep breath. You know, not confident I passed, but I don't think I failed by much, so it depends on, you know, how many points I got for specific parts, but, you know, it's one of the hardest exams I've ever taken for sure, but I did have a lot of the information in my head from some flashcards. I was pretty, pretty excited coming out of the test. I felt like there was good streaks and then some questions I blew up on, so hopefully the ones that I missed weren't too heavily weighted, but, you know, I'm not too confident I passed, but I don't think I failed by much, so it's possible that I, that I pulled it off, but we'll see. Are you out of sequesterment now? Yeah, we're all out of the sequesterment. Nobody's really that happy about it. How are you? How'd you do? Bomb the theory. That was tough. That was really, really tough, but it's an eye-opener and I know that I need to study a lot more. This is set up so that way there's a very low pass rate because you really have to earn being a Master Sommelier. This has been probably the craziest experience I've gone through. I don't, other than childbirth of course, this is probably the most intense pain I've ever felt. Now it's just, it is stressful. It's just chaotic and just a lot weighs on your mind while you're studying, trying to figure out ways to remember everything and, you know, at some point I'll get it all crammed in and we'll go from there. It was a tough exam. That theory was, it was tough. It was really a challenge. Seeing an exam, a test like this, it continues to humble you because you think that you know so much but you're always reminded that it's just the tip of the iceberg. I got service. Yay! Awesome. I got service. Good job. Thank you. Yeah, I'm so stoked. I passed the service, you know. My theory was, you know, not really giving me a look like, I thought I did all right but I, you know, he said that was my worst of three parts. The theory was the worst of my three parts and, you know, the dictation, I guess I was close. And I went, I went four for six. I was structurally good. I misapproved. Doing a very high level. 24 days. Yeah, I'm pumped. I mean, no, I mean, dude, I know I, for a second, I thought I was going to get a goose egg. I'm just stoked that I, I passed the part. To go in, you had, you had very little notice. I mean, there's that theory test was a little bit mean. You know, I don't feel like I deserve to pass tasting and theory, you know. I feel like I have a lot of work to do. I mean, in my mind, I look into the future that I will pass this exam but, you know, like that's just the way I program myself. I think that's the way you have to think. And it's corked. Well, hello there. Good afternoon, gentlemen. Mr. Cobble, how are you doing?