7th Street Wine Company

Sari and I finally decided to try out the Seventh Street Wine Company in downtown Ft. Lauderdale. Seeing this building transformed from the ad agency that previously resided in the building to the wine tasting experience it is now was exciting.

Upon crossing the threshold you pass a small foyer then are immediately met with a few low aisles of wine in front of you, coffin coolers for beer on the right, and a window peering into the private tasting room on the left. Beyond this first greeting of wine and beer there is a round counter, and a small bar at the back of the room. Continuing deeper in the direction of the counter and bar the wall to the right opens up and reveals a room filled with enomatic wine serving machines and another room housing the bulk of the available wine stock on vintage view wine racks. For those of you who have not had the pleasure of being introduced to the enomatic wine serving system, it is a new concept hailing from Italy. Wine bottles are uncorked and hooked into a machine that keeps them at the proper temperature and preserved with nitrogen. The driving force behind this new technology is that patrons are able to experience a personalized wine tasting at a reasonable cost. As the taster you get to decide which wines to try, and how much you spend. Utilizing a store issued debit card inserted into the machine it dispenses a 1.5 oz tasting. Seventh Street has bottles ranging from under $10 to over $200 hooked up to these machines. They sometimes run a blind tasting where if you can guess the maker and the style of the wine you get a good discount on that bottle…I surmised it was a Bordeaux or a Meritage, but my hypothesis of location was a state off. It turns out that the mystery bottle that evening was a Kendall-Jackson Meritage Vintner’s Reserve. This particular bottle is a Bordeaux-style Meritage, so I don’t feel too bad about getting the state wrong – California isn’t that far from Washington, right? I did buy a bottle.

Sari and I had a great time at the Seventh Street Wine Company! We were able to sample many wines from across the globe for about the cost of two glasses at a normal restaurant. The entire place has a relaxed feel to it and the employees are knowledgeable and helpful. I look forward to spending a lot more time in this location, and hopefully I’ll get some new wines to review!