Toasting Julia Child’s Love for Life
Renowned Sommelier Bobby Stuckey Just One Star
Coming to the Santa Barbara Culinary Experience
By Matt Kettmann | May 7, 2026
Read more from our Santa Barbara Culinary Experience cover story here.
“She maybe loved life more than anybody,” says renowned sommelier-restauranteur Bobby Stuckey of the late Julia Child, the TV personality, author, and chef who spent her final years at Casa Dorinda in Montecito. “That’s what everyone should take a page out of.”
The endearing legacy of Child will dovetail with the epicurean insights of Stuckey — best known for his Boulder, Colorado, restaurant Frasca — during the annual Santa Barbara Culinary Experience (SBCE), when 70 separate classes, workshops, tours, meals, and tastings will be happening countywide from May 11 to 17. The following pages detail a few of those events, including the main event, SBCE’s Grand Tasting at the Presidio on Saturday, May 16.
Stuckey, who was honored with the Julia Child Award last year, will be in town to unveil the award’s 2026 winner while also participating in a few evening conversations about wine, food, and his career. “I look forward to opening the envelope for the next award winner,” said Stuckey, who will do so during an invite-only event at Godmothers Bookstore on May 14. “I’m excited to do that.”
This will be the second year in a row that SBCE serves as the stage for announcing the award, which has been presented since 2015 by the Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts. Past honorees include globally impactful chefs such as Jacques Pépin, José Andrés, and Alice Waters, who came to SBCE last May to open the envelope with Stuckey’s name.
“I knew it was a big honor, but I didn’t realize how great it was,” said Stuckey, who received his award last October during a Napa Valley gala. “To have my mentor, Thomas Keller, and one of my mentees, Grant Reynolds, speak at the Julia Child dinner, the whole thing was just really emotional. It was overwhelming in a beautiful way.”
Before opening Frasca in 2004, Stuckey waited on Child at both The Little Nell in Aspen — on the same 1995 day as legendary violin teacher Dorothy DeLay, making for Stuckey’s “most star-studded lunch” — and then at The French Laundry in Yountville. “There are less and less of us around who are still on the dining room floor that have also had those experiences,” he said.
Stuckey’s mother, who was an avid home cook and also worked as a catering chef, regularly had Child on television as Stuckey grew up in Scottsdale, Arizona. “Julia Child was a very major part of my childhood,” said Stuckey, who appreciates how she demystified and democratized the kitchen. “She meant so much to people growing up in the late ’60s and ’70s. The bravery of embracing cooking like she did had an amazing impact. People can now say, ‘Hey, I don’t have to grow up surrounded by culinary arts to be participating in the culinary arts.’ Maybe we don’t talk about that enough.”
In addition to his flagship restaurant, Stuckey co-owns the Frasca Hospitality Group, which operates four other restaurants in Colorado, as well as Scarpetta Wines (founded in 2007) and an import company called Benvenusa (2023). He’s also a cofounder of the Independent Restaurant Coalition, an advocacy group launched during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The American wine scene has come a long way since he started down the sommelier path back in 1994. “We were just trying to figure out if we could even have wine positions here in the United States,” he recalled. “Now we know we can.”
Right after the award announcement on May 14, Stuckey will be giving a public talk at 6 p.m. at Godmothers about his book Friuli Food and Wine: Frasca Cooking from Northern Italy’s Mountains, Vineyards, and Seaside. Joining him will be James Beard Award–winning restaurateur Caroline Styne, from the AOC Group in Los Angeles, and fashion designer Heidi Merrick, who will moderate. A reception with appetizers and wine will follow.
The next evening, Stuckey and his wine director, Carlin Karr, will be at Rincon Hill Farm talking about “Balancing Wine & Health,” which will include a guided tasting, small bites, and a farm tour. As an avid marathon runner who’s surrounded by wine every day, Stuckey’s pursuit of that balance is one of his strongest passions.
“This is such a beautiful industry, but you need to take care of yourself and you need to have this balance,” said Stuckey, who’s been preaching that for decades. “It’s great that people finally want to listen to that.”
He points to his own father, who ran the L.A. Marathon at age 70. “That was after drinking some wine the night before and he was definitely drinking some wine after,” said Stuckey, who said the recent reports about wine being such a detriment to health are thin and overblown. “Look at Europe, where people drink every day and they have way longer lives than us here. I’m a product of that. I enjoy wine responsibly and enjoy exercising and having balance.”
Case in point: He’ll be leaving Santa Barbara that Saturday to go run the Venice Beach Half-Marathon with his brother on Sunday. “We are practicing what we preach,” said Stuckey.
See a full lineup of Santa Barbara Culinary Experience at sbce.events.
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