Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Sommelier's Big Day Out

For almost two decades Scott Durietz (pictured) has been the font of all wine knowledge at award-winning Baguette Restaurant in Brisbane's Racecourse Road. This week he swapped his dinner jacket for work overalls, for what some might describe as a busman's holiday.

This week Scott has been visiting the Queensland wine capital to get his hands on what really makes some of the state's top drops. The highly respected sommelier has rolled his sleeves up in the vineyards and wineries just south of Stanthorpe. His working holiday has included picking, pressing and plunging the grapes. But it wasn't all dirty work - he was able to don a white lab coat to test the grape sugar levels. Then there was the barrel sampling of earlier Granite Belt vintages. It's a tough job but someone's gotta do it.