My Road to Cicerone®: Anne Conness of Sausal Restaurant

Anne Conness is a Certified Cicerone^® from Southern California who uses her beer knowledge to enhance the dining experience at her restaurant, Sausal. Here she explains a bit about how becoming a Certified Cicerone has helped her career as a chef and beer lover.

1. Where do you work and what do you do there? 
I am the chef and owner of Sausal restaurant in El Segundo, CA. The inspiration for the menu can be directly attributed to two sources: my infatuation with beer & with Mexican ingredients – in equal measure! In my humble opinion, a plate of spicy-braised-&-smoked meats in concert with the earthy flavors of corn tortillas & beans absolutely screams for a beer at its side. So that’s what I wanted to create…a Mexican-Inspired menu with some awesome beers to pair with it.

2. How did you first hear of the Cicerone Certification Program?
In 2009, I opened a craft beer pub called Simmzy’s in Manhattan Beach, CA, with my business partner, Mike Simms. We were in the middle of a long construction delay on another project, so naturally, we were drinking a good bit of beer. The problem was there were very few places back then that offered great beer – and to get to these places, you would have to drive, and this was before Uber, and, you know the drill…

In the meantime, Mike had been brewing beer in his garage and generally driving his wife crazy what with all the equipment and his buddies hanging around ‘til all hours. SO, Mike said let’s open a craft beer bar. And we did. Next thing we knew, Strand Brewing & Eagle Rock came on line, and all the other great, local brewers followed, El Segundo Brewing, Monkish, Smog City, Beachwood, and we became friends and L.A. suddenly had a beer community.

With all the new beer that was flooding the market, there was an excitement to try everything. And this led to a new paradigm in the restaurant business: ROTATING TAPS. On the turn of a dime, our guests morphed from brand ultra-loyalists -- ordering what they always ordered every time they went out -- you know the standby movie line, “give me the usual!” – and they became a completely new kind of guest, ordering tasters and trying multiple different beers and styles in one sitting. 

While exciting, this shift presented a challenge to us as operators: the staff had to be able to talk intelligently about every new offering because in many cases the guests would not have heard of anything on the menu. Although most servers tend to be somewhat “agile” when explaining (or selling) something that they are absolutely clueless about, asking them to stay abreast of 30 rotating taps was asking the impossible. 

That’s when we heard about the Cicerone Certified Beer Server program. Seriously, unless you had time to sit down and write your own beer training program, this was an amazing solution. It provided a great overview of the fundamentals, especially of styles. We found that if servers could understand and explain styles, then they would just have to learn the style of a particular beer that is on tap that day, and then learn an interesting factoid or descriptor about that particular beer – an adjective, an unusual hop profile, or even just whether it’s “local.”

And what I’ve discovered is that once a server dips a toe into it, usually there is no turning back, and she begins to take charge of her own learning. This is a dream come true for us as operators – having a staff that is as into it as we are! It creates a good vibe for our guests, and it makes coming to work fun. 

3. Why did you choose to pursue Certified Cicerone while already working in the beer industry?
I like learning about things that I love in a geeky, “all-in” kind of way, and for many of my friends who have become Cicerones, it’s like falling down a rabbit hole. In the world of craft beer, everywhere you turn, there is more to try, more to know. 

Additionally, on a professional level, as a Chef and Director of Food & Beverage, it seemed to me to be a very worthwhile pursuit. It has helped me organize my thoughts around my menus. What styles to offer, how to integrate them into food pairings, etc. 

And as I mentioned before, most importantly, it has helped me in the area of training. Because, the sad lesson that I have finally embraced as a chef is that you can be creative as hell and put everything you love on a menu, but at the end of the day, you won’t be successful unless you can train it. 

4. Describe your study process. How did you prepare for the exam?
For me it was about tasting and reading. At work I would taste beers with my staff or managers on an almost daily basis, and then at night I read. And read. A lot! For two years.

5. What are your greatest strengths now that you’re a Certified Cicerone?
I would have to say: beer pairing dinners.

As a chef, it is a given that you must learn about wine. You are constantly being approached to host wine dinners. So I studied wine; and I followed the rules of pairing. But I wasn’t always satisfied; I had to cook within the constraints of the wine; and I felt extremely limited:

Cheese with Red Wines (wow, not really, maybe goat or blue); Any food with Oaked Chardonnay (haven’t discovered it); Lemon, Vinaigrette (risky); Fruit (too bright); Artichoke, Asparagus, Brussels or other Gutsy Greens (forget about it); Spicy (hardly ever); Tomato Sauce (nope); Chocolate (um, never); Dessert (skip it)

When I starting contemplating the idea of beer dinners, it was like suddenly there was music and light and the shackles fell away. I have come to understand that beer both embraces and enhances food; the carbonation renews and refreshes for each next bite. Creating a pairing menu is no longer a chore.

And who knew that the answer to the perennial problem of what to pair with dessert was beer! Beer? In my (newly formed) opinion, nothing pairs better with dessert than beer. Not coffee. Not tea. Not milk. But beer. Mindblowing! So now I do beer dinners and it’s my favorite thing to do as a chef. I get to work with breweries, the crowd is invariably a blast, and the pairings just sing!

6. Were there any areas of study that you became particularly interested in while preparing for the Certified Cicerone exam
I dove deep into Belgium! Took the pilgrimage to Mecca, I mean, Westvleteren. 

I love the complexity of Trappist and Abbey styles, and the breadth of foods that pair so beautifully with them:  cheeses, mussels, sausage, Brussels sprouts, asparagus, dessert. 

I’m also crazy about Lambic and Gueuze. It makes me happy that so many local brewers are building souring satellites. I’m looking forward to the time when more of our guests get into sour beer, so I won’t be the only one pouring a glass off the lonely sour sixtel!

7. What advice do you have for Certified Beer Servers who are looking into taking the Certified Cicerone exam?
It’s like training for a marathon, but seriously folks, a lot more fun!