Sicilian wine tasting, Sunday 2nd June

After talking about it for far too long, our shipment of Sicilian wine is finally here and we have set a date for a tasting. We first tasted these wines back in November and they absolutely blew us away, so we’re very excited to finally be able to share them with you…

This unique land, with ideal conditions for wine-growing and a wealth of indigenous varieties has long been Italy’s biggest grower of wine grapes, but the shift away from quantity and towards some serious quality is often under-represented on UK shelves.

From a delicious lemon sherbert fizz to fragrant, floral yet gutsy whites; soft, bold and perfumed Nero d’Avola, a meaty, burnt-orange Etna Rosso (a style often compared with good Burgundy) and a beautifully fresh Moscato, we’ll be talking you through wines (eight in total) from two estates on the eastern side of the island, Costantino from the slopes of Mt Etna, and Cantine Gulino from a little further south in Siracusa, both of which we currently have exclusively within the UK. 

A view of Mt. Etna © Sicily Tourist Guide

The tasting is at 3pm on Sunday 2nd June. Tickets are £20 each, and can be booked by calling 01273 567176, emailing us at shop@tengreenbottles.com, or booking online below.

Looking forward to seeing you there!

We’re almost booked up now, so I’ve removed the Paypal option… please email or call if you’d still like a place. Thanks!

Only a few places left at our cheese tasting this Sunday

Our cheese and wine workshop this weekend with @cheesology has proved very popular and is almost fully booked. I’ve taken tickets off sale online so we don’t overbook - if you’re still interested in coming along, please call on 01273 567176 or email shop@tengreenbottles.com and we’ll try to fit you in!

Brighton and Hove Food Festival Awards

Just a quick note to say that, if you haven’t seen already, nominations for the Food Festival Awards are now open… you can vote for your favourite Brighton bar here. Which might not be us, of course. But we’d be very happy if it was :)

Cheese and wine workshop, Sun 24th March

We’ll be tasting our way through 6 cheeses, from a light, fresh Sussex goats cheese to ‘the King of the Blues’, with a different wine to match each one. Lucie and I will be introducing and discussing the products themselves, as well as the ‘rules’ behind cheese and wine matching - and we can all discuss how well we think those rules work!

Cheesology began when Lucie, despite being brought up on Dairylea(!), sent a friend a box of artisan cheese and discovered the fantastic range of handmade cheese being made in the British Isles. She now sources and delivers boxes of artisan cheese to the Brighton and Hove area, enjoying the chance to help people get out of the ‘Camembert comfort zone’.

We’re looking forward to Lucie’s first tasting with us here at Ten Green Bottles, which will be on Sunday 24th March at 3.30pm.

Tickets are £25 each, and can be booked by calling 01273 567176, emailing us at shop@tengreenbottles.com, or online by using the Paypal button below.

Look forward to seeing some of you there!

UPDATE 22/3/13 - only a very few places left now, please call or email us on the details above if you’re still interested in coming.

Valentine’s Day at Ten Green Bottles

All day on the 14th we’ll be offering a discount (30% off) glasses of sparkling wine, with an extended list available, including Cava, Prosecco, English, Champagne, and Moscato d’Asti.

So why not join us for a glass or two before dinner, or even spend the evening here with that special someone, sampling a glass of each?!?

Meet the winemaker! Tomorrow (Saturday) from 1pm

We’re very excited to be having our friends, former Ten Green Bottles employees, and now fully-fledged winemakers, Nick Jones and Leah de Felice Renton, here tomorrow from 1pm showing off their first wine, ‘Fuse’ from the Cotes Catalane.

They are doing something really groundbreaking - making a completely different wine in a completely different place each year, and documenting the entire process, including the ingredients, on their blog.

So pop along tomorrow from 1pm to 3ish, taste the wine and have a chat with the winemakers.

I’ve posted their press release below…

HERE TODAY. WHERE TOMORROW?
‘WINES OF MOMENTARY DESTINATION’, A POP-UP WINEMAKING COLLECTIVE TAKES TO THE WING.

In the summer of 2012, Birds&Bats Productions launched a pop-up winemaking collective called Wines of Momentary Destination. Young Viticulture & Oenology degree graduates from England, headed up by Leah de Felice Renton aka ‘Birds’ and Nick ‘Bats’ Jones, formed the collective from an idea sparked on a roof terrace in France.

As bold as their abbreviated name, ‘W.M.D.’ fly in the face of traditional winemaking by never settling down. On their website they pledge to produce one wine, from one place, from one year.

The plan is to produce a series of one off wines that will be different in variety, region and style. New exciting wines will be produced each year, which will be completely different from the last.

W.M.D. advocate transparency in winemaking and all additives and recipes appear on their website for everyone to read. Fiona Beckett, weekly wine writer at the Guardian, praised this approach saying,’ Leah and Nick pledge on their website to include ‘every last detail of what is contained in the bottle’. I wish more winemakers would do the same.’

This year, the collective has released ‘fuse’, a straight Syrah labeled under the Cotes Catalan IGP. The grapes were selected from a sustainably farmed parcel and were picked, processed, packaged and imported by the collective.

Being bottled and released within 3 months of its inception, the wine seems to be a nod to Beaujolais Nouveau, yet with far greater body, complexity and structure. Only 777 bottles have been produced and can be purchased directly from birdsandbats.co.uk. The wine will be stocked primarily at The Stamford Wine Company, Lincolnshire with other UK independent wine shops and restaurants in the pipeline.

If you would like more information about W.M.D., or to schedule an interview, please call Leah 07794451562, Nick 07794451429 or email birdsandbats@live.co.uk.