Meet the Sommelier: Adam Greer of BLU ON THE HUDSON in Weehawken, NJ

Adam Greer is the sommelier of Blu on the Hudson, a modern American restaurant located on Weehawken, New Jersey’s waterfront that has quickly become a hot-spot for celebrities, athletes and a destination wine enthusiasts.  Blu also received Wine Spectator’s 2024 Award of Excellence. 

Adam received a Certification from the Court of Master Sommeliers of America. He worked with Chef John Fraserat Michelin-starred restaurant, Dovetail, where he developed a sense of how to pair wine with various dishes as the culinary creations on the menu changed daily. 

For Blu’s wine list, Adam’s strengths lie firmly in finding smaller producers, family-owned wineries and wines of outstanding value and quality. The impressive wine list features select wine regions from around the globe.

Broadwayworld had the pleasure of interviewing Adam Greer about his background and his career as the sommelier of Blu on the Hudson.

What inspired you to become interested in the world of wine?

I was a young actor, recently out of Juilliard, and I tried to resist the actor/waiter stereotype for years, working office jobs, anything other than work in restaurants.  After a few years I capitulated, realizing how conducive restaurant hours were to having mornings free to audition.  In the early 2000’s I found myself working at a terrific little restaurant on Smith Street in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn called Chestnut on Smith.  It was an amazing neighborhood restaurant on the forefront of the farm-to-table movement in this area.  The chef was a young, hungry talent just out of the Culinary Institute of America named Daniel Eardly.  The owner was a former wine industry professional named Michael Connoly.  Michael had a small but very eclectic and with professional hindsight, excellent, wine list.  Michael was passionate about wine, in an eager, open and sharing way.  His passion was exuberant, and he was an excellent educator.  I remember the owners of the wine shop across the street, another gem called “Smith & Vine” would bring bottles over, and he and Michael would taste each other blind.  They would deduce it down to old world/new world, specific country, then appellation, then guess vintages and producers.  It seemed like more than a parlor trick, it was magical.  I began to get curious about wine, and specifically how to taste wine in this purposeful way.  I would work for years and successively more high-end restaurants as a captain with a broad if not specific understanding of wine before I decided to take my Sommelier examinations, but it all started at Chestnut on Smith.

What special personal qualities or talents have enhanced your career?

I have always tried to live curiously.  I have a hunger for knowledge, and a tireless work ethic which was instilled in me early in my theater days.  I went to high school in Texas, and we had a hard-core theater department.  We were taught that it was not about having attention on you, or your ego: if you dedicated yourself to the theater, you swept the stage, you hung lights, you read every Sam French script you could get your hands on.  I think in wine I found a passion for a field of knowledge that was forever growing.  As a 20-year-old on and off server/actor, I developed a pretty good knowledge of varietals, what grapes were grown where, flavor profiles, but when I began my Sommelier training, I realized that this was less than a third of the story. There is also an agricultural/vinicultural component: vine training, climate modifiers and weather.  Then there is a geological component: soil types, slopes and drainage.  I realized I was only seeing one side of a multi-faceted industry.  The world of wine, to me, is like trying to scale a Mount Everest that is growing faster than you can climb.  There are new wine laws, codifications, subregions, being created all the time.  New wine regions constantly emerging, long-standing traditions being forced to adapt to climatic changes and innovations.  

Who have been some of your professional mentors or individuals that have inspired your work?

Michael Connoly, as mentioned in the first question, was a mentor for me, though it was almost 25 years ago and neither of us really knew it at the time.  I cut to the front of the line when it comes to the wine world.  Shortly after completing my introductory Sommelier examination, I was offered an opportunity to curate a wine list for a new restaurant in New Jersey, which sadly never opened due to the pandemic.  Instead of being a cellar rat for years, or entering any kind of apprenticeship, I began meeting sales representatives, tasting numerous wines and honestly faking it until I made it.  I felt like a fraud for a while, but honestly the 20-year restaurant background I had underneath my belt proved a solid enough foundation for me to catch up on the job.

Do you have a piece of advice for those aspiring to work in the profession?

Be true to yourself and trust your palate but be aware that a consumer's palate is different from yours. This is a world of craftsmanship, of artisanal agriculture, but also a huge sales industry. Honestly, it's a lot like Broadway: a melding of artistry and commercialism. You must walk a line between esoteric knowledge and practicality. 

Tell us a little about your travel experiences as a sommelier. 

This year I have been fortunate enough to travel to both Argentina and Italy professionally.  I was invited to stay at Alpasion Lodge and Winery, a wonderful passion project in Southern Mendoza in March, and fell in love with the rugged beauty of Argentina.  In May, I traveled to Custoza in the Southern part of Veneto on a press trip with Wine Enthusiast.  We met the local consorzio, and many of the winemakers of the region, which does not get a lot of international distribution, especially in the U.S. I am blown away by the dedication, the craftsmanship, and the quality of these wines which were not as familiar to me.

Why do you find your career as a sommelier so rewarding?

Travel is certainly a perk, and I wish I could travel more.  I love exploring the world, especially through the lens of winemaking.  You obtain a profound sense of the land, the culture and the history of each individual region, and you meet so many talented craftspeople.  The best part is that I get to bring first-hand experience back to my restaurant and pass it along to my clientele.  It brings a personal touch to the bottle I am presenting if I can say that I have met the winemaker, walked among the vines, and put my hands in the soil.

What is one of your favorite dishes and what wine would you select for it?

Syrah is one of my absolute favorite varietals, and it pairs perfectly with lamb. I would love to indulge in a perfectly cooked rack of lamb, and one of my absolute favorites wines in the world (and also, from a cost vs quality standpoint, probably the best wine on my list): Terre Rouge Sentinel Oak Syrah 1999.  Winemaker, Bill Easton, one of the original “Rhone Rangers” makes absolutely stunning Rhone-style wines, as well as Zinfandel from heritage vines left over from the gold rush days in Shenandoah Valley, California. Bill has the foresight and patience to fully indulge in the French concept of “elevage”, which is “raising the wine”. This means he will hold many of his vintages in his cellars until he feels the wines are at their optimal before releasing them to market.  In this case, we are talking 25 years, and the wine is remarkable: a complex and beautiful bouquet of spice and dark red fruit combined with a hypnotic almost pheromonal animalism.  The palate is deep and textured, gamey in a Northern Rhone style, but still expressing gorgeous California lush fruit.

Tell us a little about the restaurant or organization that you currently work with.

Blu on the Hudson, in Weehawken, New Jersey (NJ), has fulfilled something I have been chasing my entire career in hospitality.  Over the past few decades, I have gone back and forth between New York City (NYC) and NJ.  I would take a job in NJ to spend less time commuting, and have more family time, but ultimately miss the undisputable quality and standards of NYC.  I would go back to NYC for a time, and eventually burn out over the long hours and time away from my wife and kids.  At Blu on the Hudson, I may have found my white whale.  We set out to build a NY caliber restaurant in NJ, while benefiting from the one thing NYC lacks, space.  Blu is a sprawling and gorgeously appointed 30,000- square- foot modern American restaurnat in Lincoln Harbor, with stunning Manhattan views, a bespoke interior design by Peggy Leung, anda world class wine and cocktail program.  Blu Hospitality assembled an all-star cast of industry veterans to bring it to life: Executive Chef Juan Carlos “JC” Ortega (BR Guest Hospitality’s Blue Fin, Blue Water Grill, and most recently Catch Steak); Beverage Director Jeremy Le Blanche (Thyme Bar, The Gibson, German Gymnasium); sommelier Adam Greer (Dovetail, Chestnut); and General Manager Andrew Christianson (Restoration Hardware Hospitality, Morrissey Hospitality). We have a 10,000- square-foot event space with two rooftop terraces opening next year on our second floor, and we are developing a sister property in Livingston, NJ, next year as well.  I am so grateful for this team, and especially with our ownership, which has given me their full confidence, support and trust to build this wine program from the ground up, and I am very excited about the future of Blu Hospitality.

Blu on the Hudson is located at 1200 Harbor Blvd. in Weehawken, NJ.  The restaurant provides convenient valet parking for their guests for a nominal charge. It’s nice to know that they offer take-out and delivery on Grubhub and Uber Eats. For more information, menus, and hours of operation, please visit https://bluonthehudson.com/ or call 201.636.1200.  Follow Blu on the Hudson on Instagram @bluonthehudson.

Photo Credit: Joanna Lin

To post a comment, you must register and login.