This sommelier, Joan Carles Ibáñez, worked, years ago, at Racó de can Faves, Santi Santamaria's restaurant. He has always been a benchmark in the sector, because he loves his profession and knows so much that he is very humble. This humility surprises me and does not surprise me. Those who know a lot (like Pitu Roca or Ferran Centelles...) are always kind, humble, willing to learn and willing to admire. It's something I've also seen in great musicians and writers.
Since Santi Santamaria died, Joan Carles Ibáñez has been working at Lasarte. It is the three-star restaurant in the Hotel Monument on Passeig de Gràcia, "embassy" in Barcelona of chef Martín Berasategui. There is no better maître d'. With the lapel pin representing a wine opener (the classic corkscrew; a perfect design invention) he gives all the importance it deserves to each bottle, to each glass.
Once I won a prize in a wine tasting competition (the competition at the Marejol restaurant, in Vilanova). It was a couples' competition and the prize was... a bottle of Chateau Latour from '80. It was a bit reduced and I didn't feel capable of opening it myself, nor of not sharing it, no matter how it was. I took it to him and he left it in the Lasarte cellar, to rest. Then, one day we met to open it. He did a real craftsmanship job to remove the cork and recover the bottle. We shared it on the program I do on Catalunya Ràdio. Ferran Centelles was also there.
Yesterday I saw Joan Carles Ibáñez open a bottle of similar characteristics, with the cork half-sunk. Everyone brings him difficult bottles, I think. With a device that radiated heat to the neck of the bottle, he managed to decapitate it. He cut its neck, that is. It was the only way to save what was inside. Then I saw him serve a wine (a Taleia, from Ferrer Bobet) with the same meticulousness as a few minutes earlier.
Watching people who love and, therefore, know their craft work has always given me goosebumps. Like in stationery stores, when they wrap a notebook that is "for a gift," or when in clothing stores they fold (with habit and skill) a sweater to put it in your bag. Joan Carles Ibáñez gives so much importance to wine (to the one in my mythical bottle and to the one I will drink today for lunch) that he makes you give it importance too. He transmits emotion to you as if it were via bluetooth. It would be a shame if only tourists enjoyed his mastery, when they return. We must do something so that his knowledge also reaches those of us who walk this city every day.