Veronique rivest biography book
Véronique Rivest
Owner, SOIF Bar à Vin
Sommelier, Air Canada
Sommelier – Class of
Sommelier Véronique Rivest got her start in the hospitality industry at 16 when she began working in a restaurant in the ByWard Market. It was, she says, love at first sight, and the beginning of a journey that has led her to become a successful restaurateur and one of the world’s most acclaimed sommeliers.
“I had no great interest in the service industry before this,” Rivest says.
“I didn’t wake up one day as a teenager and say: ‘This is what I want to do.’ But once I was in the middle of it all, I just fell in love. I loved being around people and around food. I still didn’t know if I wanted to do this for a living. But because I enjoyed it so much, I kept working in restaurants as a student and tried to figure it out.”
But when it came time to choose a career path, she took another direction.
Veronique rivest biography images
That made her the top female sommelier in the world, a true marvel in this male-dominated domain. With her new-found celebrity status and nearing her 50th birthday, she took what some might consider an unusual turn. Instead of heading to Paris or Las Vegas to work at a posh hotel restaurant procuring rare, high-end bottles, Rivest returned home to the region of Quebec where she grew up, determined to celebrate wine at a more personal level. Last September she opened a wine bar in a former burger joint in Gatineau, on the northern bank of the Ottawa River across from Parliament Hill. She named it Soif, the French word for thirst.She decided to study languages, first earning a BA in modern languages and later, because it also interested her, an MBA in International Trade.
She completed some of her schooling in France, where she spent seven years and worked part-time in a winery. It was during this time that her direction in life was becoming clear: food, wine, languages, travelling – “It all fell in place,” she says.
Rivest began thinking seriously of wine as a career.
When she returned to Ottawa in , she took up a job at Les Fougeres, the acclaimed restaurant in Chelsea, Quebec, and another at the LCBO. Then she planned her return to school.
Veronique rivest biography wikipedia In a relatively new spin-off from our deliriously popular Young Blood Sommeliers series, we are proud to present The Old Bastard Sommeliers, who will be running in alternating months to our ongoing YBS interviews, well, that is if these Young Bloods can get off their arses to get their interviews back to me on time…. Love that question since each time it makes me realize how I never have two days that are the same. I would be bored to death always doing the same thing. The huge variety of what I do is a big part of why I love my job. Still writing weekly for La Presse online newspaper, and a few other magazines.“I wanted to keep on studying and Algonquin College offered a sommelier program. I was looking for something academic that was linked to service – to the sommelier profession, not winemaking, and taking it in the School of Hospitality was ideal.”
Graduating as part of the Class of was only the beginning. “Reaching the peak of your profession is all about hard work,” she says.
“Talent is a very small part of the equation.
Anybody can do similar things if they are strongly motivated by a subject they love, are lucky to have great teachers and a quality education, and put in countless hours of work.”
After three decades in the hospitality industry, Rivest can look back on a record of unrivalled achievement in her field in Canada. She won Canada’s Best Sommelier competition in , and repeated her win in She won the Wine Woman Award in Paris in and Best Sommelier of the Americas in
At the World’s Best Sommelier competition, she placed in the top 12 in and , and captured second place at the same competition in Tokyo in She was the first woman to appear on the podium in the history of the competition.
“I was thrilled!
People said to me, ‘Aren’t you disappointed you weren’t first?’ Are you kidding! It was awesome.
Veronique rivest biography married: Véronique Rivest is one of the most respected sommeliers in Canada and abroad. Since her very first restaurant job at the age of sixteen, she developed a true passion for wine, food and service. She now counts over thirty years’ experience in the hospitality and retail industries, as well as in education and consulting.
I just wanted to have a woman on the podium before my days were over. I haven’t felt a lot of discrimination in my profession because, well, this is Canada, right? Competing at the international level, I learned that in a lot of other countries, it’s not like that. A lot of women have looked up to me because I demonstrated how far they can go in this field.”
But competing at the international level was taking its toll.
Veronique rivest biography This article was published more than 9 years ago. Some information may no longer be current. Rivest excels at discovering culinary pairings. I don't know. It's this down-to-earth charm that makes time spent sipping wine in the company of Canada's most decorated sommelier go down like a bowl of punch at a party.It took time and money, and it kept her away from her friends and family, including her young children. Twelve years competing was enough, and in she opened SOIF Bar a Vin in Gatineau. Just one year later, it was named one of the 10 Best New Restaurants in Canada by enroute Magazine.
“Having my own place was always in the back of my mind, and I figured if I wanted to do it, now was the time.
After coming home from Tokyo in , I took a few months to savour the victory, then started working seriously on the business plan and the financing.
A year later, we opened the doors.”
Having built a reputation for excellence, companies began calling Rivest. One was Air Canada. After a six-month selection process involving wine professionals across the country, in she was named the airline’s official sommelier, tasked with selecting wines for airline’s business class customers.
Even in the midst of the disruptions caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Rivest is still going strong.
She says her education continues to play a part in everything she does.
“My teachers sparked my passion for wine, and that has never diminished. I love to learn and to teach other people. I love to give our customers, including sommeliers from other restaurants, the chance to taste wines they don’t know or can’t get anywhere else.
“When you’re strongly motivated by something, no matter what the challenges, you can find ways to achieve great results.”