Pascaline Lepeltier is probably the most decorated female sommelier on the planet. She is one of only 25 or so women to have been certified a Master Sommelier, and was the first woman to be named Meilleur Sommelier de France and also Meilleur Ouvrier de France (MOF). In 2024, she received the Decanter Rising Star award. Pascaline has written for various prominent wine guides and books in France, and is a contributor to The Oxford Companion to Wine.

Having grown up in the Loire Valley, she left an academic career in philosophy to enter the world of wine at a young age. After winning numerous awards and accolades in France, she moved to New York in 2009 to open the US outpost of the famed Michelin-star restaurant Rouge Tomate, hailed by Eric Asimov in the New York Times as 'world-class, with exquisite taste'. She has since joined the wine-focused restaurant Chambers.