A Cork in the Road

This episode features Randi Brady, creator of Diversified Vines and Taste the Playlist. She is a wine enthusiast originally from Harlem who is committed to bridging the gap between the gritty elements of hip-hop and the nuanced world of wine. She has spent the last three years creating her wine brand platform, but her most recent project is an event that allows guests to enjoy a curated playlist intently paired with fine wine. As a student of both hip-hop and wine, Randi has developed a unique perspective of interlacing the two. Influenced by her appetite for learning and passion, she decided to start on the WSET path in 2019 to advance her wine education. She currently holds a WSET 2 Award in Wines and is looking forward to starting the Champagne Master-Level program offered by Wine Scholar Guild. We talk about some of her favorite wine and music pairings - specifically a 2018 Vincent & Sophie Morey Bourgogne with 80s hip-hop! - and some of her guiding principles. You can follow her journey online @diversifiedvines and @tastetheplaylist, and you can visit www.diversifiedvines.com for her playlists and event updates. Recorded March 4, 2022

Kicking off a new season of wine stories from the Southeast, this episode features Matthew Conway - the owner, operator, and sommelier at The Tippling House in Charleston’s Elliotborough neighborhood. The Tippling House is an intimate wine bar set in a Charleston Single house, and the wine list is printed and dated every day highlighting a global selection of bottles produced by families that respect the land they farm and the history of their domaines. We talk about the goals of his wine program, why he allows all of the wines to be available by the half bottle, and how he sources from his personal cellar to create a list called “Matthew’s Stash”. He talks about how he strives to create a wine bar that caters to all wine lovers regardless of taste or budget. We chat about making the move to Charleston, South Carolina in March of 2020 after 17 years in New York City and 14 years as partner and beverage director at Restaurant Marc Forgione. Conway, a native Californian, moved to NYC in 2004 where he worked for the late Chef Gray Kunz at Café Gray in the Time Warner center from 2004-2007. In 2010, he took a short leave to work in the world-famous cellars of Taillevent in Paris, France. After returning in the fall of 2010, Restaurant Marc Forgione received one Michelin Star and shortly thereafter, Matthew became a certified coffee sommelier, was honored as one of Zagat’s “30 Under 30” in 2012 and named one of Star Chefs “Rising Star Sommeliers” of 2015. Matthew has consistently been a featured sommelier at several of the top wine events of the year including but not limited to La Paulée and La Fête du Champagne. Matthew now holds partnership at La Tablée which focuses on the Northern Rhône Valley, so we dive into what fascinates him most about this region. Since opening The Tippling House in October 2021, his team has received glowing coverage from Wine Spectator and Charleston City Paper. The Post & Courier also just named Matthew and his fiancé Carissa Hernandez a Charleston “Food and Beverage Power Couple” in February of 2022. Add The Tippling House to your list of must-visit wine destinations for your next trip to Charleston. You can visit www.thetipplinghousechs.com for more info, and you can follow @conbeazie and @tipplinghousechs on Instagram. Recorded March 2, 2022

Amanda Kimbrough is a lifelong Georgian who works in distribution for Avant Partir, a wine wholesale company selling primarily natural wine to restaurants and retailers. We talk about her journey in the wine industry and how she draws inspiration from her travels, her colleagues, and her connections in Atlanta. She’s known around town for bringing people together and advocating for the advancement of representation in the wine industry, so we chat about her insight on what makes Atlanta unique, why it's important to lower barriers to starting careers in wine, and what she thinks progress would look like in relation to gender and racial equity in the industry. You can follow her adventures at @amandabunbun on social media. Recorded December 19, 2021

Cate Hatch grew up in both Atlanta, Georgia, and Raleigh, North Carolina, and has always cherished the culture and food heritage of the American South. She is a Certified Sommelier by the Court of Master Sommeliers and a Certified Specialist of Wine since 2008. We talk about how she had the opportunity to work for and with some of the legends of southern cuisine: Scott Peacock at Watershed as a Dining Room Manager, with Kevin Gillespie at Woodfire Grill as Sommelier, and most recently, with Gina and Linton Hopkins, working her way up to Director of Operations, Leadership & Wine. In 2019, Hatch reunited with her former Woodfire Grill colleague, Joey Ward, to lead the highly anticipated restaurants Southern Belle and Georgia Boy, just months ahead of the pandemic. After a very exciting year and a half guiding the team through 2020’s strange times, we talk about what reopening Southern Belle & Georgia Boy in 2021 has been like with a renewed focus on the wine program and creative pairings. You can follow her adventures @cate_with_a_cee on social media, and you can visit www.southernbelleatl.com to learn more about the restaurants. Recorded November 16, 2021

Aaron Monu and Jamila Janneh created Wine(s) for the Culture during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown after a few bottles of wine in their Brooklyn apartment. They've since moved to live, work, and play in Atlanta, and we discuss what makes Atlanta's wine scene so unique. They share how their lives were intertwined with wine from the beginning of their relationship and how they were often the friends that people associated with wine. Their goal with Wine(s) for the Culture is to change the stigma that wine is always “fancy” or reserved for special occasions, and instead they want to open their friends' and followers’ eyes to a world and culture (with many sub-cultures) that has space for anyone to enjoy. We chat about how they both use their unique skill sets, experience, and wine knowledge to create aesthetically pleasing, educational, and sensory wine content and experiences for brands and individuals alike. Atlanta is lucky to have such a dynamic duo dedicated to normalizing the enjoyment of wine (and spirits) for the community and spreading a simple message: Wine is a lifestyle. You can follow their wine content and adventures at @winesfortheculture on social media, and you can visit www.winesfortheculture.com to learn more about their scope of work. Recorded November 7, 2021

This episode features Sam Coturri, and family legend holds that at the age of three, Sam went around a party his parents were having with a tray full of Dixie cups proudly serving “ ‘turri Wine” to the guests. So, despite his first career in politics and public relations, he really has been slinging the family hooch since he was first able to keep that tray upright. Sam was the 4th generation in his family to be born in San Francisco, but he was raised in what we now call the Moon Mountain District, first at the top of Lovall Valley Road and from the age of six on, at 16600. He is a graduate of the University of Nevada, Reno, where he studied Journalism and Political Science and tells us that he got as far away from wine business as he could muster, working for a lobbying and PR firm.  In the Spring of 2011, however, he came back to the family business to create Winery Sixteen 600, launching the first vintage to feature Stanley Mouse label art later that year. We talk about how he discovered his place in continuing a multi-generational winegrowing community and realized that no matter what he had done in the past, this was really what he was doing his whole life. When not waxing poetic about wine on The Wine Makers podcast, you can find Sam in the garden of their Sonoma home with his wife Alice, daughter Althea and dog Curry. Follow @Sixteen600 @Grapeswithaview & @winemakerspod for all his social media adventures, and you can visit www.winerysixteen600.com to learn more about his wines. Recorded November 8, 2021 

This episode features Jean-Wesley "Wes" Michel of @WineWithWes. He's currently a Global Brand Ambassador based in Washington D.C. for Michael Lavelle Wines, but he is also finishing up his degree in Business Administration with a focus on Small Business and Entrepreneurship while also studying wine as a WSET (Wine Spirits Education Trust) Level 2 student. We talk about how his road to food and wine started in his kitchen with his dad who was a chef and his mom who was always cooking, but it was his travels all over the world, from Egypt to Montreal, that sparked his pursuit of wine more deeply in 2019. As Head of Consumer and Community Engagement for Michael Lavelle, he is getting a front row seat to what goes on in the wine community, and he is also chair of The Gathering Spot's Wine Club called “Cork Club” - they discuss and deduce wines and regions from around the world every two weeks. He says that being able to teach and discuss wine to a new audience has become his latest passion, and #WineWithWes has become his platform to encompass all his love for food, wine, and photography. You can follow his “your palate will find you” adventures on social media at @winewithwes, and you can check out his blog and merchandise at www.winewithwes.com. Recorded November 1, 2021

Ryan Mullins is an Atlanta Native with 15 years as a Certified Sommelier from the Court of Master Sommeliers. Ryan currently works as a Sales Consultant with Winebow Imports where he manages winery relationships as well as sommelier relationships in Georgia. He’s a three-time winner of Vino Venue’s blind tasting competition as well as one of the founding and longest tenured members of the Atlanta Sommelier blind tasting group. Ryan has traveled extensively throughout Europe, South America, and North America and has worked a harvest in Alexander Valley, Sonoma. We talk about the utility of blind tasting, the joy of being a mentor for so many aspiring wine professionals, and his vision for the future of the wine industry in Georgia. You can follow his bottle shots and wine adventures at @ryansmullins on social media. Recorded November 5, 2022  

Sedale McCall is the owner of Untold Wine Stories, a brand that believes "Storytelling is Social Justice'' and in the power of highlighting a wide variety of wine stories. I ask him to describe the type of stories he likes to uncover, and we talk about his dedication to an academic approach to wine exploration. A Virginia native, Sedale's wine journey started in Virginia wine country, including winery tastings, harvest internships, and more. We chat about his experience working the 2021 harvest for Early Mountain Vineyards and what makes him excited about the future of Virginia wine. Sedale received his WSET Level 2 with Distinction with plans to continue his studies in American Wines and additional WSET coursework. You can follow all of his adventures on social media at @untoldwinestories. Recorded October 27, 2022.

This episode features Candace Lynn, a former elementary teacher from Pennsylvania who decided to take a chance on herself and pursue her love of wine. Born and raised in Pittsburgh, she is currently living in Napa working the 2021 harvest. We talk about what the California wine community is like compared to the East Coast, and she provides excellent insight on why she wanted to make this big move into the wine industry along with how support for wine education through the Roots Fund has propelled her studies. Candace's goal is to connect people to delicious, affordable wine all while making it approachable for everyone. She shares how she uses social media to communicate with people and spark further exploration. You can check her out during her "Wine It On Me Wednesday" wine reviews or chatting it up with other wine lovers during her "Talking Tasting Tuesdays" on her Instagram page @WineItOnMe. She shares some of her big goals for the future, and she encourages everyone to enjoy the journey of building their own wine vocabulary. Keep an eye out for her the next time you visit Napa! Recorded October 24, 2021