Press

Chicago Sun-Times
Food - April. 2006

Message in his Bottles

When you’re dining and drinking at a Bin 36 establishment in downtown Chicago, hip Wicker Park or suburban Lincolnshire, you might as well be noshing at wine director Brian Duncan’s home. That’s because it’s all about hospitality for 48-year-old Duncan, a Chicago native with contagious enthusiasm for the fruit of the vine. Whether conducting one of his restaurant’s popular “Bin School” classes or chatting with customers about his list’s newest Chenin Blune, Duncan considers it his job to “create an environment that’s comfortable” – and above all else, inject a dose of humor and approachability into this whole wine thing.

No wonder servers at the 80-seat Bin Wine Café, which opened in November in Wicker Park, wear t-shirts sporting the slogan “Drink wine. Live well. Have fun.”

But how did a guy from the far South Side – one who grew up in a Pentacostal family and didn’t even drink alcohol until college – end up the wine director at three of Chicago’s hottest vino spots?

It's all about instincts in a lot of ways. It’s like a gene,” says Duncan, one of the partners at Bin 36. “All of a sudden, things make sense even though you don’t know why.”

“Being in a position to teach staff and the public forces me to verbalize what had been instinctual.”

Duncan is a self-taught wine guru, an Illinois State University grad whose knowledge comes from years of pouring over books like The World Atlas of Wine and sipping, tasting (and of course, spitting) thousands of wines all over the world. He’s not a certified sommelier, but he can talk varietals, appellations, and terroir with the best of the business. And since wine education is his passion, he pens expressive wine list description like the one for a 2004 Morellion di Scansano from Italy, “This wine has big juicy red lips that kisses back! Yummy red fruit and earthy notes say gimme more.” Talk about piquing a wine lover’s imagination.

“My descriptions are like my cartoon boxes,” says Duncan. “When I taste the wines, I get an experiential [feelings]. I’m getting to actually talk to every single one of my guests who tastes the wine. We’re having a shared moment, even though it’s not at the same time.”

That, says Bin 36 executive chef and partner John Caputo, is one of Duncan’s greatest strengths.

“What Brian brings is twofold,” Caputo says. “No. 1, it’s his passion for wine and No. 2, his passion for making wine not snobby. He’s bringing it down to a more approachable level.

I think Americans want to know more about wine and don’t want to be treated like idiots of less intelligent people. It’s not a subject that needs to be held to a small, exclusive club.”

To his customers’ benefit, Duncan travels the globe seeking out well-crafted wines (in February, he took seven flights within Australia alone, traveling from vineyard to vineyard) from smaller producers.

I like being the first at identifying wines that are under the radar before they get Wine Spectator scores and [wine guru Robert] Parker scores. We develop a relationship that goes beyond them selling us wines.”

These relationships have led to Duncan creating about two dozen of his own Bin 36-exclusive “Brian’s Blend” wines. Partnering with California winemakers in Napa and Santa Ynez Valley counties, he buys grape varietals and decides how to blend and age them.

And with serving and wine experience that stretches back years to restaurants such as Spruce, Frontera Grill and Zinfandel, Duncan has cultivated ties with nearly 20 local distributors who seek his insights as much as he seeks out their wines.

When it comes to offering great bottles and glasses of wine at value, “Brian has a really clear vision about that, and it’s very exciting,” Susan Van Koughnett, partner in the Expedition Group, a small ultra-premium wine distributor in Winnetka that sells to Bin 36 and upscale spots such as Alinea, Blackbird and Tru.

Duncan “is such a great educator, and that’s so important in our business. He’s able to straddle both worlds and bring to the consumer [the notion] that wine’s fun.”

And that enthusiasm, coupled with a sophisticated palate, keeps Duncan in the game.

“Food and wine,” he says, “are just the excuse to get people together.”

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