story and photos by Jessie Birschbach
Jorge Corujo, wine director at Tesse Restaurant and adjoining bottle shop Boutellier Wines in West Hollywood, California, will gently correct his friends when they tell him he’s a good sommelier: “I tell them, ‘No, I’m a Boricua sommelier,’” he says, using the term by which Puerto Ricans refer to themselves. “We Puerto Ricans are resilient, we don’t give up, and we just keep going.”
Boricua generally means “local,” and Corujo fittingly puts the needs of his Angeleno neighbors above all when carrying out his sommelier duties. “The focus originally was to have the most 100-point wines in one store, wines that you probably wouldn’t be able to find anywhere else,” said Corujo, hinting at the Sunset Strip shop’s namesake: In 18th-century France, a boutellier was the royal cellar keeper. “But we think about our customers too, who are mostly recurring guests. Boutellier is also about community.”
If Boutellier considers its everyday demographic first, however, a strong element of prestige remains: When I visited in May, the sommelier—who helps to curate and sell the wines (over 3,000 SKUs) at both establishments, overseen by managing partner Jordan Ogron—eagerly led me through frosted glass doors to a long, narrow room, one side of which was lined with library wines categorized by region, namely U.S., France, Italy, and “The Forgotten,” “which is mostly Spanish,” he explained. Some of the light filtering through the glass on the other side of the room was blocked by shipping boxes filled with more precious wine. “We specialize in back vintages, and many of these wines have made history,” he added. Indeed, there were memorable Napa bottlings from the 1970s—an important era for the region, as we all know—and coveted producers and vintages from Burgundy and Bordeaux, like the 1975 Château Lafite Rothschild; perhaps most impressive was Boutellier’s large collection of Emidio Pepe stretching from 1979 to 2012.
In the main area of the shop, filled thoughtfully with not just wine but a nice little selection of tequila, Corujo pointed out another Italian wine, a proprietary Boutellier Barolo made by Cascina Adelaide and blended by Ogron. The fondness Corujo expressed for the wine was matched by his affection for his employer. But Ogron wasn’t the only mentor he spoke of warmly: Corujo got his start as a sommelier at Dorado Beach, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve, in Dorado, Puerto Rico. The wine director there encouraged his studies and eventually even his move to the United States three years ago, when he landed a job at Eataly in Los Angeles working under beverage director Luigi Capasso. “I went from stocking bottles to helping Capasso buy the bottles,” said Corujo.
Of all these mentors, however, it’s clearly his father who has been his biggest inspiration. Currently studying for WSET Level 3, Advanced Sommelier certification through the Court of Master Sommeliers, and other exams, he mused that “my mission is to eventually become a Master Sommelier just to give the pin to my dad. . . . Just to say, ‘Here Papi, this is for all your hard work, teaching me English, teaching me about wine, and all the time you took out of your own life to make me great—I want to return that to you.’” I have no doubt that the tenacious Boricua sommelier will make it happen.
