Sixty Four in Glasthule Shines for its friendly Atmosphere and great food and wine
'In a world where everything is becoming a bit average, we like to stand out from the crowd. At 64 Wine we go to great lengths to source delicious food and quality wines: To be blunt it needs to taste great to get on our shelves'
My Inlaws had been trying to organise an evening in Glasthule, in a little wine bar there they had been to six or eight months ago. Last week we finally organised to get out there on Friday evening. Both of my Parents in law, my wfie Elaine and our 15 month old daughter set out from Mount Merrion early Friday evening. They had maintained that Elaine and I would love Sixty Four and it transpired they were absolutely right.
Sixty Four Wine is located in the main street of Glasthule, alongside the upmarket food and wine emporiums Cavistons and Mitchells. From the outside it looks like a small appealing wine shop. The lighting and warm mahogany wine displays lure you in from the cold of a January night. It is only when you go in that you see it open up from the back and the atmosphere of many Friday night revellers hits you. The place was buzzing. We were five and it took us less than ten minutes to find a table and park ourselves. We ordered 4 glasses of wine to start - A vermentino for my mother in law, Dymps and I, a glass of Verjejo for Elaine and a glass of Tempranillo for my father in law, Sean.
We ordered 2 meat and cheese platters and I suspect like every other table here, it was as substantial a dinner we were going to get that evening. It was perfectly relaxing and before long the shoulders fell and the weekend had begun. We had felt we would last ten minutes in here with our daughter Sally but she was equally intruiged by the atmosphere and content faces of the 40 or so people that filled the back of Sixty Four.
CORKAGE
A pet hate of mine is the lack of space in places like this to actually browse wines. Too often the wine shelves are hidden behind a table of 5 and you cannot access the shelves to choose your wines. Sixty Four charge €7 corkage for you to drink any bottle of wine off the shelf, superb value and the cheapest that i've come across in Dublin. It means you can really enjoy some lovely wines and not feel like you are breaking the bank to do so - a win win for Sixty Four and for you.
At this point, my mother in law, Dymps took Sally home and left us to choose a bottle off the shelf. We chose Portugese, Alento from Quinta do Mouro in the Alentejo hills in the Algarve. It is a truly delicious wine from a father son team. Their more expensive icon wine, Quinta do Mouro used to be available in Ireland but no longer is now. This is the baby from the vineyard and it is typical of the jammy warm fruits that are so well grown here.
Alento is one of 550 wines we stock at WineOnline.ie but I had never tried it... shame on me. It is soft with luscious fruit and remarkably easy to drink for a full bodied wine. Its jammy fruit comes from the heat of the hills in Alentejo and the flavours develop and linger for quite a while when you are done. On the shelf it was €16.50 in Sixty Four, a little more than elsewhere but worth every penny nonetheless.
It is only available in 6 bottle cases from WineOnline.ie but a six bottle case works out at €13.33 per bottle, a nice saving when you get six bottles.
If you get a chance to go to Sixty Four, don't bring the car, perhaps getting the DART from the city or suburbs. We met the proprietor Gerard who was happily doing table rounds ensuring everyone felt welcome. The team there were second to none, with great wine advice. They created the warm, friendly atmosphere that is so infectious here.
Check out Sixty Fours opening hours as they are not open every night, nor are they open too late.
Four glasses and two bottles of wine, with 3 meat and cheese plates came to less than €100. This is superb value, even nowadays and is something that should be celebrated and shared amongst anyone willing to make the pilgrimage to Glasthule.
TOP TIP: Use the corkage option to allow yourself spend a few more Euro on a bottle of wine than you might if you were bringing a bottle home. If you spend between €15 - €18 per bottle, your wines will still cost less than they would on the menu. Go with an open mind and find something unusual. Experiment with a wine you might'nt normally buy and you will likely find something great.
Sixty Four could possibly be Dublins best kept on the South side. Tell everybody (or nobody) as placed like this are hard to come by. They are doing everything right here and we I am looking forward to the next visit already.
Call Sixty Four on +353 1 280 5664
or email info@64wine.com
64 Wine
64 Glasthule Road,
Sandycove,
Co. Dublin