Xai Xai

Yesterday, my sister in law and I decided to go wine bar hopping and chose 51^st St for our adventure because there are two wine bars across the street from one another. Our first stop of the evening was Xai Xai, which is at 369 W 51^st St.

The bar is decently spacious and features modern African style décor. It has stone floors, huge wooden columns made to look like trees, wooden beams on the ceiling, vases of reeds placed around the bar, rustic chandeliers, and of course a huge wine rack on either wall. It was very fresh looking. The atmosphere of Xai Xai was quiet at first, but it started to fill up fast with a loud 30-something happy hour crowd. It had a good energy.

All of the wines at Xai Xai are from South Africa and the menu lists each of these wines by grape variety, although the vintages for the wines are not shown. You can order three different sizes of wine here: a glass, a carafe, or a bottle. Glasses are well priced between $5 and $14, carafes, which look like they hold about 2 glasses of wine, are $11 to $19, and bottles start at $32 and the most expensive is $120. I had decided to order the Six Hands Pinotage, but the waitress had not come over to my table since pouring my water. Normally, I would wave like a madwoman try to get her attention, but since I was reviewing the place, I decided to wait it out and see how long it actually took for her to come over on her own free will. Maybe she thought I was waiting for someone. I was, but I hadn’t told her that. Then my sister in law arrived and after several minutes the waitress still hadn’t stopped by our table. She was helping people at the other tables in the bar, but apparently we were seated in the invisible section because after a grand total of 20 minutes, she finally appeared and took our order. What the heck? I thought it was pretty ridiculous.

My glass of long awaited Pinotage smelled like dried strawberries and tasted like blackberry. It was quite full bodied, but it tasted a little overripe. It was pleasant enough though, especially with the wedge of Humboldt Fog cheese that we were snacking on.

Xai Xai has very well priced wines and good happy hour specials. It has a good energy, but the service, or lack thereof, really detracted from my experience here. I give this place a rating of 3 out of 5 glasses. I would suggest you go across the street to our second stop of the night instead…

The slightly blurry (sorry) exterior of Xai Xai

A little South African flair

My glass of Pinotage

The Ten Bells

After reading Matt Kramer’s article about natural wines in Wine Spectator this week, I was inspired to find a wine bar in Manhattan that focused on this particular style of wine. Surprisingly, there is only one natural wine bar in the city and it’s The Ten Bells at 247 Broome St.

The term “natural wine” can have many different interpretations, depending on who you ask. But in general, natural wines are made with organically grown grapes that are hand picked rather than machine picked, only natural occurring yeast is added to the juice to begin fermentation, no sulfur can be added as a preservative, and the wine's flavor is not adjusted by adding oak chips or by fermenting and ageing in oak barrels (unless it's an old oak barrel, which doesn’t add flavor to the wine). Many natural wines are not filtered either, so they will have a cloudy appearance. Oftentimes these wines will have animalistic characteristics or show clarity of fruit and will taste quite unlike any ordinary wine.

The Ten Bells is unmarked on the outside. No discernible address, no Ten Bells sign…only a chalkboard advertising a $1 oysters happy hour special. Two big openings on either side of the bar serve as doors. I was just awkwardly standing there trying to figure out if I was at the right place, so I chose a side, walked in, and noticed menus on the wall listing nothing but wine. At least I knew I was at some wine bar :) I grabbed a seat at a tall marble table in the back and a waiter came up to me almost right away. There were no paper menus, so I had to go back to the front of the bar and review my choices there. I would have thought that they would try to advertise the fact that their wines were natural, but there wasn’t any indication of this on the menu. Glasses were between $8 and $13, consisting mostly of French wines. Bottles were priced between $36 and a randomly priced $394. I ordered a glass of the 2010 Roussillon, which is a white wine from the Languedoc region of France. Although ordering at the bar was a little inconvenient, the bartender brought the glass to me at my table and all of the staff were super helpful and friendly.

I should also note that this bar is cash only. So with no credit card receipt, no sign outside, and no name on the menu, I still had no way to verify that I was actually at The Ten Bells. I later compared pictures from their website to confirm that I was indeed at their wine bar. So secretive!

The wine came out in a stout little glass and it was cloudy, as I was expecting. I had actually never tried a natural wine, so this was a big first for me. I swirled the wine as best I could in the small glass and took a whiff. It smelled like pear and…this is going to sound weird, but it also smelled a little bit like wet dog. Not in the gross, stinky way, but more like the animal smell behind it if that makes any sense. Fortunately, it didn’t taste like wet dog, but more like a prickly pear. It had a medium body and a silky mouthfeel. It was different and completely unique.

The crowd was mostly younger and the bar was completely full just after 6. The bar almost had a basement feeling to it, aside from the wide open front of the bar. The lighting inside was dim, there were tin details everywhere, and lively jazz music was playing. It was kind of like an underground jazz spot or a super secret bar during the Prohibition.

The Ten Bells is a cool, hip place. It’s not the most convenient for ordering anything, but if you’re into natural wines or just want to give some a try, this is a place you should stop by. The incredibly nice, and also hilarious, staff upgraded this place to a solid 3.6 out of 5 glasses.

For more information on natural wine, check out this great article from Food & Wine.

The unmarked entrance of The Ten Bells. Notice the convenient ATM for their cash only policy

My glass of Roussillon

The bartender saw me taking pictures and surprised me by posing for one! Like I said, the staff was hilarious :)