PORTLAND WINE WEEK 2024 FEATURE: SOMMELIER Sierra Fahrmann of Bar Futo
Sponsored by Buoy Local.
Introducing the Portland Wine Week Sommelier Showcase, brought to you by Buoy Local. Portland, Maine, may be a small city, but it has an outsized reputation for wine and food thanks to the talented culinary stars behind its mouth-watering menus. When it comes to wine, Portland is dominated by women wine professionals who work hard to bring you the best bottles from across the globe. This series spotlights 10 women Sommeliers pouring phenomenal wine all Portland Wine Week-long!
Sierra’S Portland Wine Week Events:
Sierra might be one of the youngest Somm’s in the city, but her passion for the beverage industry has already taken her far and wide. She is a wine professional at a WSET Level 3, a certification she earned through an advanced course in Paris. She spoke to us about that experience when we met her at her current station: as a sommelier at Bar Futo. At 23, she sees big things in her future in wine, and so do we…
When in college in Nova Scotia, Sierra had started down the track of learning about craft beverages, though at first she homed in on craft beer. Through this she realized that the restaurant industry was going to be a lifelong passion – but couldn’t envision herself working the floor forever. She wanted to use her education to set her up for a career with lots of paths forward, so she began studying wine. “What changed was traveling to the wine region in Nova Scotia. You wouldn’t necessarily expect it just because it isn’t a very well known region, but Nova Scotia has beautiful vineyards on the Bay of Fundy side of the province. Being in a beautiful vineyard, and drinking the wine that had been grown and produced on those grounds, really inspired me to reevaluate my beer path and transition slightly to a career in wine.
She quickly realized that the culture of the wine industry could help her accomplish other objectives, both tangible and philosophical. “I always wanted to travel in life. I realized a career in wine gives me direction and opportunity to see the world and study it through the lens of wine. I learned in university that beer and wine were early indications of the establishment of civilization, and I think that really embodies the importance of food and beverage in relation to community and connection. Working with wine and understanding it better really gives you insight into history and humans.” This perspective brought her to Paris – where she completed an advanced Wine & Spirits Education Trust (also known as WSET) certification. “ I fell in love with Paris,” Sierra tells us, “My fellow students came from all over the world. Of the six of us in my class, we had people from Chile, South Africa, France (Burgundy to be exact), Singapore, and Ukraine. It was really enlightening being the only student from the US, and hearing the experiences of the others in my class made me realize we are pretty fortunate to have the diverse access to wine that we do in the US.” While her education in Paris helped her pass a critical exam in her career as a wine professional, it also opened her eyes to the differences in exposure to varietals globally, “When we were talking about wines from around the world, often people in my class had never heard of or tried the wines… I initially assumed there would be greater access to wines in Europe than in the US, but it was in many ways the opposite.”
She is approaching her nascent career with eyes (and tastebuds!) wide-open, barely out of college and with so much life-changing experiences under her belt, she is grateful for Portland as her hometown, and proud to represent it during Portland Wine Week as one of the 10 featured women sommeliers of Portland for the Grand Opening Women In Wine Dinner: Who Paired It Better? Sponsored By Bangor Savings on June 10th. To Sierra, Portland Wine Week represents how special it is that “so many women are working in wine, and being the face of wine programs across town. I also think the movement toward making wine more casual and approachable is clear in the way you see sommeliers engage and present themselves and their personalities.”
She engages this comforting aspect of hospitality at her job as floor sommelier and server at Bar Futo, which she describes as a “change of pace for the Portland restaurant scene.” Bar Futo is a modern, open-concept izakaya serving Japanese street food with an American riff. Sake, beer and cocktails fill out the robust beverage program, but Sierra is passionate about the teeny wine list, and lights up when guests appreciate the unique and inventive selection she curates. She’s working on bringing Japanese winemakers into the program and continuing to shape the small but mighty list to collaborate effortlessly with the rest of the menu.
Visit her at Bar Futo on Fore Street or during the PWW Grand Opening events.
