Maine sommelier reaches new heights in the wine world
Jenn Forge multitasks while she multitasks.
She stands at her station across from the kitchen’s pass at Twelve, where she is head sommelier. It’s early on a Tuesday night service.
Forge is reviewing invoices, planning wine buys, marking order tickets with color-coded pens, organizing pours for several tables with wine pairings, and — without missing a beat or spilling a drop — fielding questions about her remarkable, vine-like rise in the wine world.
Her coral pink fingernails skitter over one of the restaurant’s computer touch screens. Forge types fast, with percussive flourishes so fluid and graceful it gives away her background as a classically trained pianist and soprano singer. She even went to University of Southern Maine on a music scholarship 18 years ago, before leaving it behind to pursue a hospitality career.
“She picks hard things and she does them well,” said Stella Hernandez, a certified sommelier and co-owner of the former Lolita on Munjoy Hill, where Forge first fell in love with wine while working as a bartender in 2016.
Just as she once threw herself into her music, Forge, 36, has spent the last 10 years exploring the unfathomably complex field of wine. Her passionate devotion paid off: This summer, Forge became the first woman in Maine, and the first native Mainer, to earn her level 3 advanced certification from the Court of Master Sommeliers (CMS).
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Sommelier Jenn Forge puts wine bottles in racks before service at Twelve on a recent Tuesday. The sleeve tattoo on her left arm features a woman wreathed in grape vines and grapes, and light purple butterflies in memory of her late mother. (Brianna Soukup/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
It’s a notoriously rigorous, multi-stage exam with about a 75% failure rate, even higher this year. Of the roughly 350 certified sommeliers who took the theory portion of the exam in February, 85 qualified for the tasting and practical service exam in July. Of those candidates, only 27 — and just two women, including Forge — passed.
A mother of two young girls, Forge logged thousands of hours studying and tasting over a year and a half to prepare for the exam. She needed to know all about wine producers, grape varietals and vintages, of course. But advanced sommeliers are also expected to have in-depth knowledge of the geography, geology, weather patterns, soil characteristics, agriculture and viniculture practices in every wine region and subregion in the world. And that’s not even getting into the service, business and broader alcoholic beverages parts of the test.
“If she did this much work and studying in high school and college,” said her father, Bob Rothbart, of Scarborough, “she’d be working at NASA right now.”
‘I THOUGHT MY BRAIN WOULD EXPLODE’
When Forge started at Lolita, a few of her fellow staffers were studying for their certified (level 2) CMS credentials, which Hernandez already had. Forge felt compelled to earn her introductory (level 1) CMS certification.
“It becomes infectious,” she said. “Everyone around you is talking about, ‘What are the 10 crus of Beaujolais from north to south?’ and quizzing each other. I was always such a competitive person, and when you’re around that all the time — I wanted to play, right?”
She passed the level 2 certified CMS exam in 2023 while running the wine program at Twelve. Just two months earlier, her mother died of complications from alcoholism. The irony was not lost on Forge.
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“It was a weird struggle for me. Like, ‘Should I really be in this industry promoting something that killed my mom?'”
Forge unboxes bottles of wine at the restaurant on Aug. 18. Forge is the first Maine woman to earn her advanced certification from the Court of Master Sommeliers. (Brianna Soukup/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
But she also realized she wasn’t pushing $5 shot-and-a-beer specials. “When we get to this point, this is not about promoting getting drunk. It’s about promoting the consumption of quality in moderate doses.”
In her Lolita days, Forge met Scott Tyree of Freeport, the only person in Maine to hold the master sommelier diploma from the CMS, the group’s highest certification. She looked to him as a mentor, and he encouraged her to pursue her advanced certification.
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First, she had to pass a sommelier knowledge assessment exam before even being permitted to take the intensive three-day Advanced Sommelier Course, itself a prereq for the certification tests. The course costs $1,800. The exam costs $1,600, and none of that accounts for Forge’s travel expenses to testing sites in New Hampshire and Texas, or the countless bottles of wine she had to buy for blind tasting practice.
Because she was also helping raise a family and working full-time, Forge gave herself an extra year to prepare for the exam. She’d end up studying anywhere from five to 15 hours a day over 18 months. But she and her husband, Dan, decided it was worth the investment and sacrifice.
“Doing this as a parent is borderline insane,” Forge said. “Thank God for the support of my husband and my dad.”
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“It definitely made it hard from time to time when your spouse is home, but they’re not home,” said Dan Forge. “They have to study, so you’ve got to take on everything else. I joked about being a single parent. But she was so dedicated, I wanted to support her the best I could.”
She drew herself dozens of wine region maps as study aids for the written theory exam, which goes into astonishingly granular detail about all aspects of wine and the wider beverage world (somms need to be well versed in alcoholic drinks across the board), along with business and service principles.
A sample wine question from the 252-page study guide Forge compiled for herself: “What is historically and commercially the most famous Vitis vinifera varietal in China, and what does it translate to?” Answer: “Longyan, or ‘dragon’s eye.'” Ever the overachiever, Forge added in her notes to herself that Longyan is grown in the Hebei Province, and has been put to notable use by Chinese producers Great Wall Wine.
“There were definitely times I thought my brain would explode with the amount of information going in,” Forge said. “The more you learn about wine, the more you realize you know nothing about wine.”
‘THE MOST NERVE-WRACKING PART’
After passing the theory exam in February, Forge qualified for the multi-day service practical and tasting exam in July. She’d done some practice blind tastings and mock wine services with Tyree and another master sommelier, Brahm Callahan of Boston. At home in South Portland, Dan would pull bottles from the wine fridge to set up blind tastings for her.
Day one of the exam involved a timed business and service practical at the Ritz-Carlton in Dallas. Forge had to parse minute data from a simulated restaurant wine sales report, check a wine list for spelling and factual errors, recommend wine and spirits pairings for dishes on a mock menu and analyze flights of wine and whiskey.
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The master sommelier proctors tested her ability to make cocktails, serve them in the proper glassware, and decant wines, grilling her throughout. They evaluated her sparkling wine service form: Does she serve glasses and pour from the right? Wipe the bottle after a pour? Remove the cork with just the barest whisper of carbonation, not a vulgar pop and foamy sploosh?
Forge is the first Maine woman to earn her advanced certification from the Court of Master Sommeliers. (Brianna Soukup/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
“The composure it takes to pass these exams is incredible,” said Hernandez, who also has her terminal Level 4 Diploma from the Wine & Spirit Education trust. “A lot of people who are very knowledgeable and incredible sommeliers struggle under the pressure of that exam environment.”
Proper service form had mostly become second nature to Forge from her time in the industry. Her experience handling the pressures of musical performance also helped her think on her feet during the timed tests.
“It’s like, ‘Can you do these things while you’re holding a conversation and getting drilled on a bunch of questions they’re throwing at you?’ Because it’s built into my system, it gives me more time to focus on the questions they’re asking me, so I don’t get as tripped up.”
The last day of the exam was the blind tasting. “It’s the most nerve-wracking part of the examination for anyone,” Forge said.
Two master sommeliers met with her in a tiny room, presenting three reds and three whites. She had 25 minutes to identify each wine’s region, grape varietal and vintage.
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Sommeliers employ what is called the Deductive Tasting Method here. They examine every facet of the wine: color, clarity, brightness and viscosity; subtle aromas they pick up from the nose; information they glean from tasting about acid, sweetness, tannins, alcohol content, body and finish. The method is aptly named — this is some Sherlock Holmes-meets-CSI level of deduction.
Jenn Forge wears her Court of Master Sommeliers advanced certification “green pin” on her lapel. (Brianna Soukup/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
“So for the first portion, sight,” Forge explained, “I would say something along the lines of, ‘Wine number one is a clear white wine, pale straw in color with moderate-plus intensity leading out to a green-silvery rim as secondary coloration. No evidence of gas or sediment, and the viscosity is moderate-plus.'”
The next day, Forge returned to the test site to learn whether she’d passed. She and several of her fellow candidates felt good enough about their chances — and certainly about putting this grueling process behind them — that they’d celebrated at a local bar after the blind tasting and arrived “super hungover.”
She met with two of the master somms who had been testing her. But Tyree, an exam proctor who recused himself from testing Forge, was also present.
“When I saw him, I pretty much knew at that point,” Forge said. “They said, ‘How are you feeling?’ And I said, ‘Cautiously optimistic.’ They said, ‘Congratulations, you passed.’ And of course, Scott and I turn into total blubbering messes.”
THE HOSPITALITY GENE
What makes Forge even more valuable as a somm, beyond her staggering breadth and depth of wine knowledge, is how she connects with guests.
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“Last time I was at Twelve, I just watched her around the room,” Tyree said. “And I was so drawn to what she was doing, not only because she’s a colleague, but she moves really beautifully around a table. She’s very engaging with guests. She’s kind of disarming, and makes people comfortable with their choices of wine.
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“That’s a great sommelier to me,” he added. “That kind of personality is not something you can teach. She has the hospitality gene.”
“We have a lot of guests who specifically want to dine when Jenn is working, because she makes them feel they’re trying something really special,” said Colin Wyatt, culinary director of Prentice Hospitality Group, which includes Twelve. “She imparts some of her knowledge to you, and it makes you feel you’re seeing or tasting something for the first time.”
On the floor of Twelve this evening, Forge moves and talks briskly but smoothly, gliding through the dining room to deliver and explain wine pairings. Her brief spiels are personable but polished, informative but concise enough to be unobtrusive.
Forge sets up a corner of the restaurant before dinner service on Aug. 18. (Brianna Soukup/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
The couple at table 34 raves about the pairing for their swordfish course, the best chenin blanc they’ve ever had. Forge lets them know when they shop for chenin blanc, to look for sec (dry) and not the sweeter demi-sec option.
“We love your passion,” table 32 tells her. Minutes later, she’ll make a few notes in Twelve’s database about the couple being wine lovers from the Augusta area so she can take good care of them next time.
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Forge goes deep with a party of seven, who are curious about how vine louses have affected wine root stocks around the world. They’ve recently been on a trip to the Douro Valley in Portugal, where one of the paired wines is from. She serves them glasses of a 2019 Stony Hill chardonnay from Napa Valley.
“This is not an oaky, buttery-style chardonnay,” Forge explains. “This is much prettier, and it almost has an orange blossom characteristic.” Then, with a sly smile and a nod toward dishes arriving from the kitchen: “You have enough butter coming your way.”
AN IRRESISTIBLE CHALLENGE
In her four years at Twelve, Forge has expanded the wine program from about 80 bottles to more than 375, ranging from $50 to $2,000. Each year, the restaurant has won the Wine Spectator Award of Excellence.
“It’s impressive to see how much she’s been able to achieve in such a short amount of time,” said Wyatt. “You don’t come across people like Jenn very often.”
Forge figures she’ll likely go for her master certification, though she wouldn’t feel fully ready until 2028. But she wants to consult with some master somms first.
“I want to talk to these guys and just say, ‘Do you think this is something that would be wise for me to do?’ Because I put in a lot of work, and this is also sacrificial for my husband and daughters. But I also feel like if you can do something, shouldn’t you try?”
Forge mentions that the CMS has something called the Krug Cup, an award given to candidates who pass all three portions of the master diploma exam on the first try. Only 14 somms have ever won it. While earning the master certification even after multiple attempts is a crowning achievement, the Krug Cup may be the highest career note she could hit.
Like Mallory climbing Mount Everest “because it’s there,” Forge seems constitutionally unable to resist the challenge. “It’s something that’s possible,” she shrugs. “My dad would say, ‘I have four sons, and my daughter has a bigger set of balls than any of them.'”
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Tim Cebula has been a food writer and editor for 23 years. A former correspondent for The Boston Globe food section, his work has appeared in Time, Health, Food & Wine, CNN.com, and Boston magazine,. More by Tim Cebula
