Name: What it's like drinking beer on the job as a cicerone, or beer sommelier
Uploaded: 2023-01-25
Duration: 5 min 48 s
Description: Toshihiro Saito, the assistant director of F&B operations at Hotel Barrière Fouquet's New York, delves into what it takes to become a certified cicerone, also known as a beer sommelier. He also shows us how to pair five different beers with food. Please note: The following beers are not sold at Hotel Barrière Fouquet's New York and prices may vary.

Toshihiro Saito, the assistant director of F&B operations at Hotel Barrière Fouquet's New York, delves into what it takes to become a certified cicerone, also known as a beer sommelier. He also shows us how to pair five different beers with food. Please note: The following beers are not sold at Hotel Barrière Fouquet's New York and prices may vary.

What it's like drinking beer on the job as a cicerone, or beer sommelier

Features

Toshihiro Saito of Hotel Barrière Fouquet's New York delves into what it takes to become a certified cicerone, or beer sommelier.

Being paid to drink beer as a cicerone, or beer sommelier

Toshihiro Saito, the assistant director of F&B operations at Hotel Barrière Fouquet's New York, delves into what it takes to become a certified cicerone, also known as a beer sommelier. He also shows us how to pair five different beers with food. 

Toshihiro Saito, the assistant director of F&B operations at Hotel Barrière Fouquet's New York, delves into what it takes to become a certified cicerone, also known as a beer sommelier.

Bye, slight bitterness but not anything extreme. I am a certified C, it's also known as I think the very first idea of beer or c sort of comes off as a person who's drinking beer all day. Unfortunately, it's, it's not as glamorous as that. There's actually a lot of leg work that actually goes into it before the beer actually ever gets presented to the guest. You need to start doing tastings, you need to start doing pairings, you need to start building out beer menus, finding the right glassware, getting the right chillers. I was working at Gastro Pub at the Venetian. There weren't too many people in Las Vegas that actually had such a wide selection of beers. They had a actually on our staff when I started talking to him. I, I started figuring out, you know what, there's so much more to learn about beer than I actually already knew. I knew about IP A si knew about ports. I knew about stouts, but to start talking about beer in a way that was almost like so romantic to become a, I think you really just sort of need to be a beer nerd. At heart, you need to start picking up books. You need to actually start doing your research, your knowledge about all the different styles of beer. You have to know about the srm, the gravity of each beer, how it's been brewed, how it's been made, the history behind it. What it's supposed to taste like being able to talk about it, almost like wine. I think I've tasted about 500 beers now. Maybe even more. There has been one or two instances where I have become slightly inebriated, opening up magnums of chime or doing these fantastic beard tastings, beard dinners. It's just one of the first of the job becoming Saron was probably one of the most difficult tests and exams that I've actually ever come across. There's actually four different certifications. Each one has to be completed before you can go on to the next level. The exam was actually the course of an entire day. It was tasting for a major portion of it. The knowledge and theory portion of it was probably over 50%. And then beer pairing was, I think another 25% of the actual exam. It was an extremely arduous test but very fulfilling. Rewarding. Even after everything was done today, we're here at Hotel Barrier Phuket and we're going to be trying five different beers. We have a really nice, beautiful assortment going from light to dark. This is Gaffle cos this is a very unique solid beer that actually hails from the region of cologne in Germany. Think of champagne. Ok. I would pair this with fried chicken. It would be really nice carbonation just to go ahead and cut through the fat on the chicken. This is Dupont. There's a really nice malt background to it. It is a farmhouse ale so it has a little bit of like a barnyard y sort of characteristic to it. But phenomenal. One of the best pairings of my entire life was actually done with the ce on. I had this particular style with a triple cream cheese, a little bit of honey comb and with a really nice crusty baguette. And that was the absolute moment where the light bulb went off. And I said, wow, pairing beer and food is such a magical experience. This beer is, is trace Fontaine from dust translation. It means three Fountains. The style is an oat goose is actually a blend of three different lambic. One year, two year, three year lambic from Linda. It actually pairs extremely well with a hot lobster roll the butter, the bread, the sweetness of the lobster itself, extremely delightful pairing. This is, it is a Flemish bread coming from Belgium. However, this beer itself is actually brewed in Italy is triple fermented first time in stainless steel and then a in cognac barrels. This beer pairs extremely well with barbecued meats such as brisket and also strawberry cheesecake. So this beer is poo. It's an Imperial Baltic porter hailing from the region of Estonia, it actually comes from the area of the Baltic Sea. Yeah, is much more malt driven. So you have flavors of coffee, chocolate, even really nice rich molasses. This particular beer pairs extremely well with say a coffee crusted steak or even a flourless chocolate cake. When I first started. I thought that 300 beers was the crazy exorbitant amount for a beer list. Now, in days, I mean, I've come across places that are even over 506 100 different skews for beers. CS are definitely more in demand. Now, people are much more in tune to what's in their glass. They want to know more. They want to be able to go ahead and find these fantastic beers and they're asking the right questions. Is there a time that's too early that I drink beer? No, I come from Las Vegas. Absolutely not.