On wine, without the lecture

We have three hundred bottles in the cellar. Almost all of them come from people we have met. Some of those people have been making wine for forty years. Some of them only have a few hectares and a borrowed press. None of them are interested in being on a list at a steakhouse.

I get asked, almost every night, whether you have to be a wine person to order from us. The answer is no. The list is not a test. It is a long, slightly opinionated note about what we have been drinking lately, organized roughly by mood. There is a section called "crisp, cold, easy" and a section called "a little funky" and a section called "this is what we open for the staff after service." That last one is the one I would order from.

If you would like a recommendation, tell us a thing or two. What you ate last week and liked. What you usually drink at home. Whether you want something that goes with everything or something that has an opinion. We will pour a small taste before we open a bottle. If it is wrong, we will pick a different one.

What we will not do is recite tasting notes at you. There is a kind of restaurant where you are made to feel like the wine is the point. Lumina is not that restaurant. The wine is here to make the food taste better and the table feel slower. That is all it has to do.

If you want to learn something, we are happy to talk. After the second course, when the room has settled, ask the host to send me over. I will bring whatever bottle we are excited about that night. I might bring two.