Cup o' Joe

Food, travel, and news on the Chesapeake Bay

Stopped by the Real Seafood Company Restaurant and Sushi Bar at the Annapolis Towne Center for lunch the other day. The sushi and raw bars looked impressive, but I was particularly enamored with the way-cool Personal Wine Tasting Station. The thing looks like a large wooden TV console, but instead of the television, both open sides hold eight climate-controlled wine bottles and a dispenser tap for each one.

Here’s the deal: You purchase a special wine card and swipe it through. Push the appropriate button and you can sample either a taste, a half glass, or a full glass. So if you’re curious about that bottle of 2007 Rodney Strong Pinot Noir, but don’t want to blow $12 on a glass, you can taste it for two bucks.

Twin computer monitors on either side of the unit provide the skinny on each wine, including recommended food pairings and production techniques.

But here’s the best part: Go during happy hour, from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., and if you buy a $10 card, you automatically get $15 worth of wine. And—get this—you can use it anytime, not just during happy hour, and you can buy as much as you want. So if you drop $100, you get $150 worth of vino. A very tasty deal, if you ask me.

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Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 07/03/09 at 10:26 AM

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