Sommelier likes it hot
In January 1984, after finishing his national service, Philippe Faure-Brac toured France's wine-growing regions. "At night, I slept in the car in my sleeping bag," he says. "By day, I tasted wines." Returning to Paris, he stocked 20 wines in a small bar he opened on the busy Boulevard Haussmann - Le Bistrot du Sommelier.
It was a first step for the young ex-student of a catering college in Nice, who was determined to open his own business by the age of 25. From the outset, he planned to create a restaurant centred on wine. It's an ambition he has amply fulfilled - the sprawling 17th-century cellars underneath his dining room, once the Parisian caves of Veuve Cliquot, hold a treasure trove of 800 wines from around the world.
His menus, too, have evolved from saucisson and boiled potatoes, sold for a few francs, into a six-course dinner in which each dish is accompanied by a separate wine. What sets him apart from his peers is his willingness to look outside France for the wines. He combs the global vineyard for New Zealand Cloudy Bay, Australian Cape Mentelle, Chilean Los Vascos, Austrian Ausbruch Feiler Artinger and many others, setting them alongside the best his native France can offer.
This cosmopolitan approach reflects his international status as a sommelier. He won the Meilleur Sommelier de France title in 1988 and took the World Championship in Argentina in 1992. Between victories, he travelled, tasted, memorised and, in the process, set aside any prejudices he may have had about the supremacy of all French wines.
Given the patron's oenological pedigree, itisn't surprising that Bistrot du Sommelier's chef, Jean-Michel Descloux, has to work hard to keep pace. It's a problem which Faure-Brac recognises. "You can change the seasoning of a dish, its garnish, or the sauce at the last moment to enhance the quality of the wine," he says, "but you can't change the contents of the bottle once it is on the table, except to serve it in a decanter, or change its temperature."
His kitchen is tiny, more appropriate to its original purpose of serving snacks. Despite the size, he uses it to service an eclectic à la carte with 25 dishes, which are neither cheap nor always simple to prepare. At lunchtime, when the custom is mainly from the local business community, a main dish, a dessert, coffee and wine can cost less than £25 per head, but the bill can quite easily double in the evening.
At that time, his talents are stretched to the limit because many diners choose the special Ffr390 (£50) six-course menu - Harmonie des vins et des mets (marriage of wine and food), which offers an amuse-bouche, two entrées, a main course, cheese and dessert to match six glasses of wine. He also has to service a 24-seat private dining room and create special menus for gala events.
Special harmony
Understanding the relationships between food and wine is a blind spot for many chefs. Chef Descloux plans the special "harmony" menus alongside his patron. Together they taste the wines to be served, analysing them in detail before Descloux puts forward his recipe suggestions. To show off the wines to best advantage, he aims for few, contrasting flavours on the plate rather than complicated combinations.
Next, he will present his proposed dishes to Philippe Faure-Brac for his approval. After testing, they may go on to the menu as plats du jour. Finally, if they are popular there, they will graduate to the à la carte, from which the special wine and food menus are composed.
In style, they represent a halfway house between the full-blown specialities served in gastronomic restaurants and more simple bistrot fare. The restaurant rates two knives and forks from Michelin and 13/20 from Gault/Millau, an accurate reflection of a cuisine which is on the up.
At first glance, the prices of both the food and the wines seem high against those of comparable British restaurants. There are reasons both fiscal and traditional for this.
Wine mark-ups across the Channel have always been higher than those in the UK - 300% is common (a tradition which goes back to the days when even Champagne was relatively cheap) and Faure-Brac agrees they can be even greater for the least costly ones on his list: "They have to be or I wouldn't sell them." The figures on the menu include a 15% service charge on the item plus a further VAT charge of 20.6%. Tag on a minimum wage policy and higher National Insurance charges than over here, and a restaurateur has to work harder for his profits.
Weakness of the pound
This position is further distorted by the relative weakness of the pound against the French franc.
Despite regular morning slots on television and Europe One, videos on the marriage of food and drink, and a regular column in a consumer magazine, Cuisine, Faure-Brac hasn't found other would-be patrons queuing up to copy his formula. The typical Parisian bar à vin still prefers to stick with middle of the road wines, Poilane bread and smoked salmon or jambon de campagne.
A high profile has helped him fill his 50-seat bistrot through a recession which shows few signs of abating. The genuine enthusiasm forwines shown by those who dine there and by the sommeliers who assist him combine to create a unique atmosphere which is neither precious nor snobbish.
Although the seating, silverware, linen and Villeroy and Bosch plates belong to a more formal style of dining, the hustle and bustle of waiters between cramped tables in an almost decorless room stays true to the spirit of a bistrot.
Bistrot du Sommelier, 97 Boulevard Haussmann, 75008 Paris.Tel: 00 33 1 42 65 24 85
