1 of 4 Black master sommeliers in world, Napa Valley man wants to expand access to wine education

The story of how Vincent Morrow became one of only four Black master sommeliers in the world begins improbably in a Phoenix suburb where wine was served, if it was served at all, from cheap bottles and jugs.

Morrow was a soccer kid, the middle of three boys born to an Italian-American mother and Black father who met in the military and later moved to Arizona seeking new opportunities in the desert.

The family considered themselves working-class. Nevertheless, other kids taunted Morrow and his brothers for attending school “by the tracks.”

“There were definitely more affluent sections,” Morrow said recently of Peoria, Arizona. The town has a population of over 190,000. “Whenever we'd play some of the other schools, like that was just kind of the consensus about us.”

One of only a few Black kids in his class, Morrow found he could level the field by playing soccer, often under his mom’s tutelage. While working as an accountant, Joanna Morrow founded a youth soccer team and was, for a time, her son’s coach.

That special relationship carried Morrow to Sonoma State University, where he played soccer for the Seawolves. When his mother visited him in Rohnert Park, Morrow drove her to wine tasting rooms. The outings changed the course of his life.

Morrow went on to earn a degree in wine business from SSU. At 35, he is now the wine director at Press Restaurant, a Michelin-starred restaurant in Napa Valley, and one of only 273 people worldwide to hold the prestigious title of master sommelier.

Award-winning work, recognition

In December 2022, the prestigious Michelin Guide named Morrow California’s Sommelier of the Year.

“I’m just proud as who knows what,” Joanna Morrow said from Manteca, in California’s Central Valley, where she and her husband, who is also named Vincent, now reside. “I know how difficult it was to attain that title and all the education that goes into it.”

As a board member of the Court of Master Sommeliers — the nonprofit organization that administers the Master exam — and member of the organization’s diversity committee, Morrow is spearheading efforts to open up the often rarified wine world to a more diverse audience.

He is doing so in part by helping to bring the Court’s $700 introductory wine course for free to Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) students at colleges and universities across the country.

Thomas Price, who became the world’s first Black master sommelier in 2012 and founded the Court’s diversity committee, said Morrow is a “mentally tough son-of-a-gun” whose exceptionally strong leadership skills are making the organization's future shine brighter than its past.

Chris Gaither, a close friend of Morrow’s and the world’s fourth Black master sommelier, said Morrow is the “epitome of hospitality. And as a friend and meeting him in a very relaxed setting, he’s very, very kind and also very generous with his time.”

Becoming a master, twice

On a recent Thursday afternoon at Press Restaurant, Morrow discussed his meteoric rise in the nation’s food and beverage industry while he relaxed in the restaurant’s Harvest Room prior to the dinner rush.

He wore a blue suit and gray tie, and around his left wrist was a designer watch, one of five he owns to match outfits. His facial hair was trimmed with precision.

On his suit jacket, a tiny red and gold lapel pin adorned with the words “Master Sommelier” and the image of Bacchus, the Greek god of wine, was the only outward display of his special status.

Concealed by his white dress shirt, however, was a much more revealing detail — a tattoo of an asterisk, about the size of a half-dollar, situated at the base of his throat.

The symbol of cheats and scoundrels — Morrow, in fact, referenced baseball’s steroid era in describing it — is one of his defining features, a curiosity for a man who by many accounts has led an impeccably moral and ethical life.

He got the tattoo at a Rohnert Park establishment shortly after he passed the master sommelier exam in 2020. But in the moment, he was focused on one of the darkest periods of his life.

In 2018, the Court of Master Sommeliers stripped Morrow and 22 other newly minted master sommeliers of their titles following a cheating scandal that rocked the global wine establishment and garnered international headlines.

The court took the unprecedented action after a proctor overseeing the blind-tasting exam was discovered to have leaked information to an unknown number of the candidates.

To be clear, Morrow was not accused of cheating. But he, like the others, fell under suspicion as a result of the proctor’s actions.

A symbol of defiance

Reflecting on that time at Press Restaurant, Morrow said he understood on some level why the court’s Board of Directors believed they had no choice but to invalidate the tests. Had they not, some people would always wonder whether the titles were legitimately earned.

Morrow faced a gut-wrenching choice in the wake of the invalidations: whether to walk away from a dream that had cost him years of grueling effort and tens of thousands of dollars, or go through it all over again.

On average, master sommelier candidates spend nearly a decade and up to $100,000 of their own money on the process, with no guarantee of success, according to Price.

Morrow never wavered. Two years after the invalidation, and after spending an additional $7,000 on wines to practice for the blind tasting, he officially earned the title of master sommelier, this time for good.

In his view, the asterisk tattoo is a symbol of defiance.

“You know, for me, it’s more of a positive,” he said. “Being one of the few people that had to endure that and hopefully nobody else ever will again.”

Price, who resigned his post on the court’s Board of Directors a few months after the cheating scandal, praised Morrow’s resolve, and that of others who retook the test, who he said were “victimized” by the incident.

“I have so much respect for their fortitude, their inner strength, their power,” Price said. “It’s a big testament to Vinny and to me, frankly, that we’ve become fast friends out of that.”

Making wine education more accessible

Price is the former national director of wine education for Jackson Family Wines. Last year, he moved to Georgia to assume the title of master sommelier in residence at 1856, a teaching restaurant in Auburn University’s new Tony and Libba Rane Culinary Science Center.

He and Morrow have teamed up to expand the court’s introductory wine course to diverse student populations, including at Virginia State, one of the country’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

Gaither, who also is involved in the education effort, said people of color too often fail to see themselves in the wine world.

He said one of his greatest pleasures at Ungrafted, the San Francisco wine bar and bottle shop he opened in 2019 with his wife, Rebecca Fineman — herself a master sommelier — is seeing BIPOC customers walk through the door and feel immediately at ease.

“For a very long time, you had gatekeepers who had very specific viewpoints on wine and how it should be enjoyed,” Gaither, a graduate of Atlanta’s Morehouse College, said. “To be honest, a lot of those viewpoints are outdated and a little bit biased toward socioeconomics and race.

“Nowadays,” he continued, “we have the situation where anybody can walk into Ungrafted or go into Press Restaurant and have access to a well-curated wine list.”

Morrow wants to make wine more inclusive for young people of color, as well as for women and people of diverse sexual orientations.

“That’s what I love about wine to begin with,” he said. “It should be accessible and a means for people to come together. Everyone should be extended that opportunity and then they can decide whether they want it.”

Catalyst for change

In the wake of a sexual misconduct scandal in the Court of Master Sommeliers that broke in 2020, Morrow vowed publicly on a post to his Instagram account to be part of the change he said was urgently needed within the organization.

“To the women and other underrepresented communities in the wine industry, know that you have master sommeliers who are allies and are demanding radical change instead of giving you lip service,” he wrote.

Morrow was later appointed chairperson of the court’s diversity committee. He also pushed for revisions to the organization’s bylaws and testing procedures to strengthen transparency and to make it easier for anyone to attempt the master sommelier exam.

The 2022 class was the most diverse in history, including two women and four master sommeliers of color.

“That was the whole reason I continued on,” Morrow said. “To be part of making not just the organization better, but the industry better.”

As a biracial man, Morrow could just as easily be profiled about his Italian-American heritage. In fact, his mother said she recently discovered the reason she was not allowed into her family’s Philadelphia basement was because her grandfather was making wine there.

However, Joanna Morrow said she understands the focus on her son’s Black heritage.

“I appreciate seeing this because I’ve always been one to make sure everyone’s included,” she said. “I think that rubbed off on him.”

Morrow’s sense of fairness is such that he felt compelled to reach out to Michelin to correct inaccuracies in the prestigious guidebook.

In an email to the company, he wrote that the guide featured an outdated description of Press Restaurant as essentially a run-of-the-mill steakhouse, well after executive chef Philip Tessier arrived in late 2019 to overhaul the St. Helena Highway establishment.

Tessier and Morrow first met in 2013 while working at the French Laundry, one of the world’s premier restaurants.

Morrow’s outreach apparently had an impact. In December 2022, Press Restaurant was awarded a coveted Michelin star at a Los Angeles ceremony in which Morrow was also honored as California’s top master sommelier.

Morrow’s aspirations include having a broader director’s role at Press Restaurant, starting a family — his girlfriend is currently preparing for the master sommelier exam — and having more free time for outside interests, including surfing the Sonoma Coast.

No matter what, he said he’ll approach future challenges with the same determination he felt prior to taking the master sommelier exam — not once, but twice.

“Even if it doesn’t work out, I’m coming back,” he said.