Gettin’ Low with Lulu McAllister Churchill of Nopa
Lulu McAllister Churchill, 31, is the wine director at Nopa and their sister restaurants Liholiho Yacht Club and Nopalito. We met Lulu a few years ago through our friend Johan Churchill (and her now husband, who also works in the wine industry.)
We sat on her roof deck in the Western Addition to talk about life at Nopa (including Magnum Mondays), her upcoming honeymoon and things she’s learned this year.
What are you excited about right now?
I'm starting to plan our belated honeymoon. We're going to Japan for 10 days and Hawaii. I went to Japan when I was 16, so its been over a decade. I loved it then, I'm going to love it more now since I have more access in the food realm. (Side note: read about her sake list at Liho in Wine & Sprits Magazine when she was named Best New Sommelier.)
You did a series for Nopalize called Breakfast Chronicles that documented what folks at Nopa ate for breakfast. What's your morning routine?
I eat a lot of leftovers for breakfast; occasionally Nopa leftovers: fried rice with kale, pieces of pork chop. I'm sure people don’t consider that breakfast.
I’m a certified pastry chef (it was the first thing I did out of high school.) It serves me little professionally, but when I have an upwelling of creativity, I’ll bake something on the weekend.
We got a waffle machine as a gift registry present. I made a largely cornmeal based waffle and I put kefir-fermented blueberries on top and cashew cream.
If you were to drink wine with breakfast, which one would it be?
My parents like to joke KJ (Kendall Jackson). For me, probably sparking rose.
Who do you think is a badass bitch?
Professor Teresa Moore, my journalism teacher at the University of San Francisco (USF). I'm supposed to call her Teresa now, but I can't — my respect for her still makes me want to call her professor.
I started as a food writer at the school paper. My first article was a review of XYZ, a restaurant at the W Hotel. It was a really overwrought and fussy article, but I was thrilled that I had done it and turned it in. I thought, “I did this article on my own, of course they’re going to love it.”
Theresa slammed me. She was the first teacher to give me some really real talk. Everyone else was like, “A for effort!” I had put in a lot of effort. But she was like, “This isn’t actually that good.”
As a freshman, that really hurt, but in a good kind of way. It made me want to please her more.
Another person is Christie Dufault, my wine instructor from the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) at Greystone. Everything about her is very graceful. When she says something silly or makes a mistake, she’s graceful in her dismount. The way she carries herself left big impression on me.
Doing research for this interview, we came across the phrase “trigger wine” — a wine enthusiast’s first love, so to speak. What was your trigger wine?
I grew up drinking champagne as a little girl, so I didn't have a moment. Wine as always a part of the table and complementary to the food I already loved. I had many wines afterward this would've been a trigger wine, but getting into wine was something that I stumbled into pretty naturally.
What is it like to a be a woman in the industry?
Most of the time I don't really notice. It’s never been too much of an issue. I refuse to acknowledge if there is one.
How did you end up at NOPA?
I knew I loved the company and Chris Deegan, the former wine director. When I was hired, I worked as a hostess for six months and then I took over the wine program when he left.
Starting out everything was difficult. The wine list was an adopted child that I already loved, but didn’t know very well.
What are your days like at work?
I’m usually on the floor either at Nopa or Liholiho. During the day I could be at any of four restaurants [ed note: like the Nopalito’s] during administrative stuff like training staff, updating menus, tasting wine with reps and organizing the wine storage. It’s a minimum of 12-hour days at both places — admin stuff, inventory tasting, changing the menu, write notes from new wines, organizing the wine vault.
Then I'm there for service at one of the restaurants. The hours are hard physically and emotionally. It’s a very full 12 hour day.
Tell us about how you started Magnum Mondays.
Magnum Mondays has existed for the majority of my four years at Nopa, which is hard to believe. It was inspired by Michael Madrigale at Bar Boulud, who was pouring high-end stuff by the glass.
I was trying to find Magnums that I could pour around $16 — magnum for the people! We had some Magnums sitting around and I thought, “What are people waiting for?” We try and make it more accessible by having people buy into it.
Name a few things you learned in 2016.
- It’s difficult to change your last name.
- 30 was the most exciting year of my life so far.
- My sister and I got married two weeks apart. Johan and I eloped, then two weeks later we went to my sisters wedding.
Anything you want to explore?
Parenting — I’d love to have kids. I'd love to have my own wine shop with Johan. I'd love to live abroad. I'm sure I will want to travel for the rest of my life. There’s nowhere I wouldn't consider visiting.
