Photo by Emily Ferretti, courtesy of Copper Vine
When Chef Amy Mehrtens and Sommelier Lydia Kurkoski are planning one of Copper Vine’s wine experiences, it starts with little ideas dropped in passing conversations. “We kind of have a natural process,” explained Kurkoski. “I’ll just meet her while she’s working one day and say, ‘What do you think of doing this for the next wine dinner?’ A lot of small conversations, that eventually break down to a place where we’re like ‘Okay, we want to do this.’”
At that point, Kurkoski—based on their initial vision—will source the wines, and the two women will schedule a day to sit down after work for a tasting. Together, they’ll talk through the taste profile of each glass—discussing qualities like color, structure, flavor, and aroma. From there, they’ll reach for something in each wine that’s harder to define.
“Nostalgia,” said Mehrtens, who sips each wine in search of particular ingredients it brings to mind. Together, they discuss what the wine makes them think of: particular experiences, foods. After taking pages of notes, the two identify the basic flavors they’ll bring together for a particular experience. And Mehrtens will step away to build out each specific dish. “At that point, I’m like, ‘Okay, how can this be more creative? How can this be more fun? What if we did this traditional dish with a spin on it with this one wine? Because this nostalgically makes me think of something specific.”
Both transplants to the Crescent City, the two women have been working together since Copper Vine opened at the corner of Poydras and Dryades in 2018.
"Okay, how can this be more creative? How can this be more fun? What if we did this traditional dish with a spin on it with this one wine? Because this nostalgically makes me think of something specific.” —Chef Amy Mehrtens
Kurkoski made her way there via Tulane University, where she studied business while pursuing a lifelong passion for hospitality—fostered early on in the kitchens of her Polish family in Upstate New York. “I was always surrounded by huge tables of food and people, and that was always near and dear to my heart,” she said. While completing her degree, she started working at Domenica as a hostess, eventually working her way into the beverage program there before meeting Chef Mike Brewer, who was at the time opening Copper Vine as executive chef. “He brought me in for an interview, and I’ve been here ever since,” she said. Today she works as the restaurant’s sommelier, as well as its Sales and Events Manager.
[Read about the origins of Petit Sirah wines here.]
Mehrtens also found her way into the industry at a young age, growing up in a traveling military family with a mother as a chef. “The center of our house was really the kitchen,” she said. “We used to do huge parties when I was a little kid, and I would be passing out hors d’oeuvres.” After completing her degree at The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, she set out to travel the world, landing in New Orleans. She started out working at Commander’s Palace as a salad cook, moving her way up through the ranks. For a while she operated her own personal chef business, and then she got the offer to open Copper Vine as a sous chef. “And the rest is history.” She was named Executive Chef in 2020.
“We’ve been working together since day one,” said Kurkoski. “We’ve both held many different positions, both starting in the deep end of operations. And that’s slowly evolved into roles that allow us to drive the creative process at Copper Vine more. And we both have a really great natural chemistry that we both enjoy.”
Photo by Emily Ferretti, courtesy of Copper Vine
The idea of bolstering Copper Vine’s wine programming has been in the works for some time, Kurkoski explained. But as was the case for many businesses over the past year, the pandemic and the bandwidth it provided during phases of reduced operations opened up space to discuss the future of the restaurant. “We were just about two years old, and sat down to look at, you know, ‘This is who we are. This is who we have said we are. Where can we put extra energy to really solidify this foundation and build on what we have currently?’”
The resulting wine experiences, offered in the form of Private Wine Dinners and Wine Tastings, are according to Kurkoski the culmination of Copper Vine’s overall mission: “to create something that offers an enriching experience that hopefully creates an enduring, lasting interest and appreciation for food and beverage in a way that meets them where they are and brings it to their table how they want it.”
[Read about how Wild Child Wines is bringing natural wines to Acadiana here.]
Copper Vine’s Private Wine Dinners feature a creative menu curated with special wine pairings and the particular guest in mind. These can be booked for groups of eight to fifty people. The Wine Tastings, on the other hand, are smaller affairs featuring a curated and themed flight of wine paired with Mehrten’s artfully-prepared bites. Each experience is set apart by the guidance of one of Copper Vine’s wine experts, who caters the tasting to the guest’s particular interests.
“Sometimes during the tasting process, we are also catching up, and stories will come out,” said Kurkoski. “We talk about our childhoods and other things like that, and often that is what helps us build out the theme and the sense of storytelling we try to bring to this programming.”
“Some people are interested in the terroir and viticulture practices,” explained Kurkoski. “Some packages offer an exploration of style within a single varietal, or a focus on new innovations and practices in the industry, like natural wine. And then there are just exceptional stories of the people behind the glass. They want to hear stories like Susana Balbo’s, the story of Argentina’s first female winemaker. And some people are just there to have fun, too. These are each an aspect of character that builds the entire industry and makes the entire industry special and extraordinary, but in the interest of accessibility, it’s also okay to only offer this little piece of insight that can be incredibly enriching and meaningful.”
Mehrten described the engine behind Copper Vine’s experiences as one of community, bringing together the stories of the people behind the wine in the glass, the stories of the farmers who grew the food on the plate to a guest’s table. And all of it is, of course, wrapped up in Mehrten and Kurkoski’s own stories: “Sometimes during the tasting process, we are also catching up, and stories will come out,” said Kurkoski. “We talk about our childhoods and other things like that, and often that is what helps us build out the theme and the sense of storytelling we try to bring to this programming.”
Because this is what food and wine is ultimately all about, she said. It, in many ways, goes back to those childhoods spent in the kitchen, family all around. “It’s about togetherness, about being at a table sharing an experience.”
Visit coppervine.com to reserve a Private Wine Dinner or Wine Tasting.
