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Wednesday
Jun222011

The Drunken Horse

I made my way over to the west side of Manhattan to go to The Drunken Horse last night. I thought the name sounded kind of awesome, so I decided to make the trek there for my next review. It’s located at 225 10th Ave (at 23rd St).

This is a very cool place! When you first walk in, there is a cozy seating area with velvet couches and a coffee table in front of a fireplace. It’s quite inviting, really and set up like a New York sized little living room. Light indie rock was playing, some Florence & The Machine as well (yay!), and there was artwork for sale on the walls which gives the bar a local feel. The back area of the bar is where I set myself up for the review. There was a pretty light green bench that spanned an entire wall and there is a wall of wine at the end of the room.

This place has an easy atmosphere. Easy, that’s the first word that popped into my head and I’m thinking I should stick with it. It’s not cramped, the music sounds like something you’d throw on while hanging out at home, the wine menu is straightforward with no separate bottle list. Instead, every wine has two columns of prices that depict whether you can order it by the glass or bottle (or both), and the small food menu is full of comfort foods like hummus and grilled cheese. Easy, right? I’m going with it.

Glasses are between $9 and $13 and bottles are no more than $56, save the two special wines that are over $100. I would have to say that it is a touch overpriced for the wine that is served.

I ordered the 2008 Chateau D' Haurets Bordeaux. In my wine class the night before, we were tasting some Bordeaux and it really made me crave a glass of it. This one, however, was not as good as I was hoping. It smelled a little young and had a very simple raspberry flavor and short length. It was full bodied, a little mild on acidity, and had a slight oily feeling. It almost tasted like a house wine. While this isn’t necessarily a bad wine, it didn’t really show the rich and complex qualities that are typical of a good Bordeaux wine.

Ok, I had to try a second glass because I didn’t want to leave disappointed. I really wanted to like this charming, tucked away bar. So, I switched to white wine and ordered the 2008 Domaine Balland Chapuis Sancerre from France. This wine was MUCH better. It even smelled of a higher quality wine than my first glass. It was clean on the nose and smelled like fresh grapefruit. It was also very tasty! It was bright and crisp and had the tangy and sweet flavors of grapefruit as well. Great balance of fruit and acidity and very refreshing. This wine was $13, as compared to my $11 glass of Bordeaux and it turns out that this is right around the retail cost of a bottle of the wine. It was a little more than I want to pay for a good glass of wine, but that’s what you need to do at this place.

The service was good. There was only 1 bartender and 1 bus boy and they seemed very busy once the place picked up around 6pm. Even so, the bartender would stop by my table often and brought my wine and food out quickly. Yes, I ordered another cheesy appetizer. Cheese cigars. Brilliant.

Overall, I did enjoy this bar. It’s a little out of the way and expensive, but it’s worth the visit if you don’t mind walking to 10th Ave. I give The Drunken Horse a rating of 3.3 out of 5 glasses.

The seating area in the back of the bar

My glass of OK Bordeaux and the Cheese Cigars. Sidenote: I need a nice camera.

Glorious Sancerre

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