Decanter World Wine AwardsFine dining goes hi-tech as restaurants embrace iPad wine lists
- Wednesday 1 February 2012
The trend that started at the beginning of the century with Aureole in Las Vegas, the contents of whose four-storey, stainless-steel-and-glass wine tower that diners browse via an ‘ewinebook’, has now gone global, Brian St Pierre writes in the latest issue of Decanter.
‘These days, I’m using an iPad more than a corkscrew,’ Ronan Sayburn MS, wine director for the Hotel du Vin chain, told St Pierre. ‘We’re trialling them in Birmingham and 90% of our customers have liked them.’
The list of UK restaurants that now present customers with an iPad instead of a paper wine list is gettting longer every day: several of Gordon Ramsay’s restaurants, Asian-fusion restaurant Australasia in Manchester, London’s Rib Room, and the Vineyard,which has one of the most comprehensive American wine lists in the country.
‘It will give our guests the opportunity to better look at our long wine list and easily access their preferences, but without replacing our interaction,’ Vineyard head sommelier Yohann Jousselin said.
Worldwide, St Pierre namechecks restuarants from New York (Thomas Keller’s Per Se), Argentina (La Bourgogne at the Alvear Palace among some 80 others), Brazil, Ireland, Italy, Spain and points between that have adopted the iPad.
Even France, he writes, is succumbing to the lure of the tablet. While one sommelier is quoted as saying the iPad will never catch on, St Pierre is able to list half a dozen restaurants, starting with Les Tablettes in Paris, that use it.
Not everyone is equally keen, however, with several high-ranking professionals expressing doubt.
Andrew Connor, of Luytens restaurant in London, is one. ‘Too many times technology has let me down,’ he says. ‘Air-conditioning broken, reservation systems crashed, lights gone crazy – I prefer a low-tech solution where possible.’
Read the whole article in the March issue of Decanter, on sale now and available on iPad.
Have your say!
Adam Segal
July 01 08:54
Since I started using iPad menus with the "eMenu pro" app- sales are up! Especially desserts and wine. Great investment!
Bob Hay
May 15 12:21
Tried the Wine Fi one in Hotel Du Vin, that was pretty good.
Wish there were more of these things around, it makes things so much easier.
Vitor
February 27 13:11
Here in Brazil we have WineTag (www.winetag.com.br) which is a social network for wine lovers where you can post your own reviews of wine and read reviews of others. They too offer a software for restaurants and stores for a digital wine list and menu. I've seen some of them and they are actually really cool. The nice part is that the software also offer sugestions for food pairings considering the restaurant's menu and wine list. That makes it easier for people to choose a good wine.
Michael
February 18 13:20
Claire - there is no capital outlay with the SmartCellar system it's just a monthly fee which covers all the hardware and software development. With restaurants reporting on average a wine spend increase of 20% the system should more than pay for itself. I don't think it's the case that independents have to miss out on this trend. Michael