Providence has been a vital part of L.A.'s fine dining scene for over 10 years, an award-winning restaurant where chef Michael Cimarusti crafts unbelievable seafood-centric dishes. Another standout component: the wine, curated by sommelier David Osenbach who joined the Providence team in October 2015. Osenbach, who previously worked at Josie in Santa Monica for 10 years, has the enviable task of pairing wine with Providence's tasting menus, molding each diner's experience with a selection of reds, whites and bubbly. We chatted with him about how he got into wine, his favorite spots to drink in L.A. and what he does when he's hit the bottle a little too hard.
How did you get into wine?
I actually went to music school. One of the stranger things about me is that I have a Bachelor’s in composition and a Master’s to be an orchestra conductor—which is tremendously useful [sarcastically]. While I was in music school I worked in restaurants; I actually worked in back of the house, in the kitchen. I always enjoyed doing that. So after music school I decided to go to cooking school—my parents were like, "Well, you know, we would have preferred law school, but whatever you want to do!" I went to the Culinary Institute of America in New York for two years, and that was the first place where I had a real wine and spirits education class. After that I moved to L.A. because I thought the weather would be nicer than Hudson Valley, New York. The first job I had was a management job where I also dealt with the wine program, and then it progressed from there.
Providence is your first tasting-menu-only restaurant. Has that been a challenge?
It’s easier in one way, because you know what people are going to eat before they come in the door. But it’s also a little more difficult because it means that, for us, the bulk of what we sell are all wine pairings for the menu, and there are three tasting menus so I need to have a constant set of wines to go with each menu. I need to keep that interesting, and keep it logistically working as well. But it keeps me on my toes.
What wine do you always keep in your fridge?
I always have a bottle of reisling. It might not be the same one, but reisling goes with everything. I was going to say I like to cook Asian food, but I don’t really—I like to order Asian food, and reisling goes with that. And there’s always a bottle of champagne in there.
Where in L.A. do you go to drink great wine?
I love going to Augustine, because there’s always something crazy and interesting. I like Faith & Flower because Jared [Hooper, Faith & Flower's wine director] is a friend of mine, and there’s a little eclectic list that he rotates through. He always has secret stuff stashed away, and when I come by he’s like, "You have to try this."
Have you noticed any recent trends in wine?
I’ve seen a little bit of a return to the classics. We had a brief moment in time when all the somms were finding really obscure stuff—orange wines and natural sparkling wines and all this stuff that was really cool—and now it's like hey, here’s really good, solid California chardonnay that’s not crazy or buttery. I think I’m going to see a Bordeaux resurgence coming around. Nobody wanted to talk about it because it was too expensive and it was like your grandfather’s wine, but now there are some really good things coming out of Bordeaux.
Do you have a hangover cure?
Yes! Nutritional yeast. You can buy it at Whole Foods and it looks like this weird, yellowish brown flaky powder. You’re supposed to take it and sprinkle it on your popcorn, because it has this kind of parmesan flavor. But it’s loaded with B vitamins, so after a night of indulging, you just take a big spoonful of nutritional yeast and try to swallow it and then chase it with a glass of water. Also, drinking all day long works really well. If you’re trying to be good all day and then you go out, you’re done. If you start your day with champagne at brunch, just let it trickle on throughout the day.
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