Keith McNally, a well-known New York restaurateur, amusedly recounted a costly mishap on his Instagram account.
The managers of his establishment "Le Balthazar", located in the Soho district, indeed served a 1989 Château Mouton Rothschild at 2000 dollars to a young couple of customers who had ordered a Pinot noir at ... 18 dollars.
Read also: French agricultural products, cheeses and wines hit hard by the rise of the euro
“
Four Wall Street businessmen ordered the restaurant's most expensive red wine: a $ 2,000 bottle of Chateau Mouton Rothschild
,” he says.
So that his customers can fully enjoy this vintage, one of the restaurant managers put the wine to decant in a carafe.
At the same time, a young couple ordered "
the cheapest red wine in the restaurant, an $ 18 Pinot noir
" which they wanted to be served in a carafe, says Keith McNally.
The two wines being poured into identical decanters, one of the two managers made a mistake when placing the orders.
"
Taking by mistake the wine decanted at 18 dollars for the Rothschild at 2000 dollars, the first manager officially served the cheap wine to the businessmen (...) The young couple who ordered the Pinot Noir at 18 dollars s 'is inadvertently seen serving the $ 2,000 Chateau Mouton Rothschild,
' writes the restaurant owner.
""
I knew very well that it was not a Mouton Rothschild!
"
Keith McNally was particularly amused by the customer response.
While one of the businessmen who presented himself as a wine connoisseur was ecstatic in front of his guests about the “
purity
” of his wine, the two lovers convinced to drink cheap wine pretended to drink a wine. expensive wine by parodying "
the manners of a wine snob
", reports the owner of Balthazar.
Warned by the managers a few minutes after the incident, Keith McNally rushed to the restaurant.
He says he was faced with a dilemma: admit the manager's mistake or let the businessmen continue to drink cheap wine (the cheapest solution).
"
I decided (...) to tell the truth to both parties
" he explains.
The owner says the businessman reacted by saying “
I knew he wasn't a Mouton Rothschild!
His guests simply nodded with a simple nod.
For its part, the young couple was obviously delighted to hear this news and confided to Keith McNally that it was "
as if the bank had made a mistake in their favor
".
"
The problem is, I was the one who lost $ 2,000, not the bank,
" comments the restaurant owner.
Read also: Another look at wine
Yet McNally keeps smiling and prefers to look at the positive side of this mistake.
“
Both groups left Balthazar happy that night, but the younger of the two left even happier
,” he concludes.
/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/prisa/I7VDOA36LJC3ZK5KUHFHE2COJA.jpg)
/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/prisa/DWNMLKJJCJB7TBU7EWSPPPIT6Y.jpg)
