from apparel manufacturing to cost management in cardiac care centers. Giving in to a lifelong desire to cook, Gil fled publishing for the kitchens of the world's greatest cooking school—The Culinary Institute of America. After graduating first in his class and winning the Commanderie de Bordeaux Scholarship for Wine Studies, Gil figured he would start working in restaurants to gain valuable cooking experience. Instead, Gil headed to the dining room as a sommelier. He worked for three years at Atlanta's Cherokee Town Club, home to an exquisite, 25,000-bottle wine collection. While he worked nights at Cherokee, he helped start The Atlanta Wine Report magazine. The magazine thrived. Soon, Gil had to give up on the dining room to focus on the magazine, which was now distributed throughout the Southeast. In 2005, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution came calling to offer Gil a weekly wine column in its Food & Drink section. The column Kulers Uncorked--a chronicle of Gil's witty and anything-but-pretentious journeys in the wine world--was born. Shortly after, Golf Digest sought out Gil to develop By The Bottle, a wine column for its new lifestyles magazine called Index. Somewhere during this flurry of success, Gil survived the rigorous certification exam of the Society of Wine Educators to become one of 122 Certified Wine Educators in the world. These days when he's not writing for one publication or another, Gil can be found in front of a class at the Southern Wine Education Center, helping people discover their inner wine lover.


Wine Kulers' Mission Statement

Read Whoever You Want,
But Drink What You Like.
"Wine Is Too Pretentious For Me..."

I hear ya. The world is full of wine lovers and wine writers with a snobbish streak a mile wide. The aristocratic wine connoisseur is a relatively new arrival on the landscape, however. Wine has been enjoyed by mankind for nearly 8,000 years. It is one of the reasons we gave up our nomadic ways on our march toward civilization. It's no wonder. Wine has the uncanny ability to bring friends and family to the table and help them linger there longer; it is the currency of of a healthy, full, civilized life. As Benjamin Franklin said: "Wine is constant proof that God loves us and loves to see us happy." My goal is to help folks who are mystified by wine or find it unapproachable. I want them to find the happiness underneath the cork...or screwcap, as the case may be.