“It could be an extension of a consumer trend where wine is now being seen as more casual and fun and less for special occasions less for white-tablecloth French restaurants, more for going out for a bite,” says John Gillespie, executive director of Wine Market Council, an industry group. Arrive early, they’re quiet and soothing come late and they’re hopping.Ĭlearly one reason for the wine bar boomlet is simply that Angelenos have fallen in love with wine. They’re like coffeehouses for the enologically curious, or those who just like a glass of something interesting and a tasty bite. Whether slick or funky, with elaborate menus or just a few snacks, the new wine bars are eminently welcoming and laid-back. The conditional permit process is simpler in Pasadena than it is in L.A., he says.
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or Santa Monica or any other community,” says Art Rodriguez, a Pasadena-based liquor license consultant who facilitates licensing throughout the state. “In Pasadena, it’s easier to get a liquor license than it is in L.A. Beside La Maschera, there’s 2-month-old Crepe Vine, also in Old Town, and Madeleine’s Restaurant & Wine Bistro, on East Green Street. Pasadena has become a hotbed of wine bars, with three new ones joining old standbys Bodega Wine Bar and E’s Wine Bar and Restaurant. Locals wash down wild mushroom bruschetta or mini smoked salmon pizza with glasses of Pinot Grigio or Barbera d’Asti. Just as personal, but quite different, is 2-month-old La Maschera Ristorante’s wine lounge in Old Town Pasadena, where a DJ spins chill-out music on Friday nights while Charlie Chaplin films are projected on a wall. They ask for a glass of red.” He purposely sought a long, narrow space, he says, “to mimic what the taverns look like in Europe.” And no one goes into a tavern and asks for a particular wine. In Europe, Cordova says, “it’s customary to drink in small glasses. “You can’t drink a glass of wine and not enjoy it, even if it’s mediocre.” He serves wine in glasses small enough to make aficionados of a certain stripe bristle.
Or alone.”ĬORDOVA, whose wine list typically includes just 13 to 15 wines, all Spanish, is an anti-snob. “When I lived in Spain,” he says, “one of my favorite things to do was to sit down in a nice environment that feels cozy and enjoy a nice bottle of wine with friends. Returning to Los Angeles after living for a year in the Spanish capital, he brought with him a dream of opening a wine bar. “You have a tavern every 10 feet in Madrid,” says owner Kenny Cordova, who opened the place three months ago. Even Fleming’s, a nationwide chain of high-end steakhouses with a new location in Woodland Hills, calls itself not a bar and grill, but “prime steakhouse and wine bar.” They include a cash-only, roughhewn Fairfax district hideaway that stays open till 2 a.m., and a sleek, Christopher Lowell-designed indoor-outdoor space in a Manhattan Beach boutique hotel. Their range, stylistic and geographic, is striking. Restaurant openings may have slowed to a crawl in the last few months, but no fewer than nine wine bars have opened, with several more on the way.
Interested in an oloroso? The Bodegas Dios Baco is just the thing, hazelnutty and rich and deep burnished gold.
Nothing could be better with that plate of 18-month-aged jamon serrano and Spanish cheeses than a little glass of “La Gitana” Manzanilla. In Studio City, an exciting selection of sherry accompanies the bar snacks at Next Door, a stylish new tapas lounge attached to La Loggia Italian restaurant. It’s Wednesday night, and the narrow little place is packed. Friends huddle over plates of salumi and cheese, dipping breadsticks into tapenade and sipping Nero d’Avola from Sicily or Malbec from Argentina. A chalkboard over the long wooden bar lists some 45 wines by the glass. QUICKER than you can say “Cruvinet,” Los Angeles has become quite the town for wine lovers looking for a little fun.Ĭonsider the 5-month-old wine bar Vinoteca Farfalla in Los Feliz.
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