Backroom Wines : Joe Gilsdorf

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Joe Gilsdorf

Our man Joe is a transplant from Wisconsin, where his passion for food and wine (and beer and spirits) developed as he followed the customary arc of years in the bar and restaurant trade: a kid quietly mixing the salt and pepper shakers and melting straws in the table’s candle as his mom dined out with friends in the early years; dishwasher, busboy, and cook through high school; cook and bartender through a Philosophy degree; bartender, wine merchant, tobacconist, and (finally!) restaurateur – cleaning up after fledgling straw-melters – after that.

As proprietor of the aforementioned friendly, neighborhood “bar with food”, Joe came to find that he most enjoyed doing the hard work of developing, growing, and sharing his “remarkable and ever-changing” wine list. If there was a focus, one could say that it was to seek out, learn about, and snap up the real wine gems available in the local marketplace (or not), and make them available at a fair price to the noble patrons that had come to trust his sound advice. [Sound familiar?]

The restaurant life and general wanderlust led to plenty of “working vacations” in and around Napa. Not surprisingly, over time all the sunshine affected his brain and lure of the “wine country lifestyle” mesmerized Joe like so many others. After a few years of throwing little tantrums before getting on the plane headed back home, the proverbial light buzzed, popped, and lit: Why not just move, and stay? Some arranging of ducks into rows commenced, and right around harvest of ’08 he did just that. So far, he’s managed to survive the harsh California winters without too much trouble.

Presently, Joe couldn’t be happier to be working with the venerable Mr. Dawson at Back Room Wines – a champion of the “little guy”, the quality-before-quantity producer, and the winemaker-as-artist; a purveyor of the delicious, and a generally good fella.