Belltown Wine Walk

This week, Mike and I headed to the Belltown Wine Walk - a new wine event that some of the restaurants and bars in Belltown are doing on the second Tuesday of every month, from 5 - 9 p.m.

I first heard about it on Twitter - and quickly gathered my boyfriend's approval for a night of $5 tastings in the neighborhood just down from my house in Queen Anne. Because of traffic, Mike was a little late to my house after work, so we didn't get started until 7 p.m.

While the list of places participating in the wine walk are as such (starting in order from North to South)...

Urban Wine Cafe: Corner of 2nd & Denny
Local Vine; Second Avenue [ 2nd & Vine Street ]
Seattle Cellars: 2505 2nd Ave # 102 [Between Vine & Wall]
El Gaucho: 6:20 - 7:00: 2505 First Avenue [On First, between Vine & Wall ]
Branzino: 2429 2nd Ave [Between Wall & Battery]
Rob Roy: 5:40-6:20: 2323 2nd Avenue [Between Battery & Bell]
Rendezvous: 5:00 - 5:40: 2322 2nd Ave

...we decided to skip the Urban Wine Cafe since it was quite a bit further distance to the other bars, and we just wanted to park and walk. We first hit up The Local Vine, which is great wine bar we've been to a couple times before. The Local Vine had CMS from Hedges Winery as their tasting for white wine. CMS is a blend of Chardonnay, Marsanne and Sauv Blanc. The wine was quite versatile and mellow - it probably could have been paired with a number of summertime dishes. The Local Vine paired it with a thyme & ginger polenta with carrot frisee salad.

We thought the dish and pairing was quite impressive! The bartender told us that The Local Vine chooses a new wine and food pairing each week - and for only $5 for both! Five bucks for both a full-sized glass of wine and a small plate is more than worth my time!

From TLV, we moved onto Seattle Cellars, but were kinda surprised to see that it closed at 7 p.m. We had read the wine walk went from 5 to 9 p.m., and there was no word that one of the places closed early! Sort of a bummer, but we'll have to remember that if we do it again.

So, we continued onto Branzino, which is what I was most excited about. Branzino is the restaurant of Chef Ashley Merriman, one of the two Seattle chefs chosen to be on Top Chef 6! I cannot describe how excited I am to watch local chefs. We sat at the bar at Branzino and were given the choice of a white or red for our wine walk tasting. We chose the white - a chardonnay from Airfield Estates, a winery in Yakima. Branzino didn't have a dish for the pairing, which we were more than a little disappointed about. But, we decided to split a bar plate anyway. We ordered the crispy meatballs with creamy polenta.

Sorry for the crappy cell phone pic! The lighting was dim.

Two dishes of polenta for us! (I'm kind of a polenta fan). We both agreed that we enjoyed the polenta at TLV a little better, but that says nothing about our thoughts on Branzino! We want to go back to try it out for the full-meal dinner! While we were at the bar, I was able to watch Ashley Merriman in action and even went up to her before we left, to personally congratulate her on her Top Chef placement. I'm such a dork! But it's like a local celebrity! I love that show!

From there, we only had time for one more stop - Rob Roy, formally known as Viceroy. Rob Roy didn't have a food pairing either, but they did have complimentary Goldfish crackers! Ha! We dug right in! The white wine they offered was a Riesling from Clean Slate wineries. (Come to find out, it's won Best Riesling at the 2007 San Francisco International Wine Festival). It was GOOD. We definitely gave it the vote for Best Wine of the night. I will probably try to seek it out in a grocery store. For overall experience and money value though, The Local Vine gets our vote x 1,000!

Final Verdict: Probably go back. We might hit up the Belltown Wine Walk again, but this time we'll try to go to the places we skipped. I imagine El Gaucho will have a great pairing! We'll most definitely go back to TLV for the $5 wine walk deal, but will probably pass on the other two places we went. We were expecting more of a tasting experience, not just a $5 glass of wine. Overall though, it was something fun and different to do on a Tuesday.