Sip, Swirl and Savour

Sip,Swirl&Savour

A Guide to the Island’s Best Wines & Spirits

From expert gin producers to eco-friendly vineyards and cocktail entrepreneurs, the Island is home to an impressive array of distillers and drinks makers. Add to that our trusty and knowledgeable wine wholesalers who source the best of home and abroad to fill their shelves and supply our cellars. With that, we thought it was high time to turn the spotlight on them and celebrate what they do best. So, chill those glasses and zest that lemon as we explore some of the best wines and spirits the Island has to offer. Chin-chin!

Pinkmead Estate and Vineyard

Stretching along the western bank of the River Medina (just as the waterway reaches a kink on its way from Newport to Cowes), you’ll find the Pinkmead Estate — 24 acres of unspoilt country on the marshy fringes of the Island’s biggest river. Since 2019, hundreds of young vines have called this place home, and whilst it’s still early days, their first mini-harvest has already taken place. The estate aims to offer English sparkling, white, and rosé wines, grown biodynamically, pesticide-free, and completely organically (making it one of only twenty organic vineyards in the entire UK). Pressed grape skins will be used to create skincare products and the 6,000 on-site honey bees will pollinate the wildflowers of Pinkmead and beyond. In the meantime, while the vines reach maturity, you can book yourself a stay in the estate’s luxury accommodation, with bicycles and an electric buggy on standby to whizz you around the grounds and a complimentary bottle of gin in each room — made with botanicals foraged from Pinkmead itself. pinkmeadestate.co.uk

Isle of Wight Cocktail Company

Shake, pour, enjoy — that’s just how simple it is with the award-winning drinks from the Isle of Wight Cocktail Company. Their classy, brown, screen-printed bottles have been springing up in pubs and farm shops across the Island (and across the water too), and it’s really no surprise. ’Handmade for badasses’ (as their website explains) the Ryde-based business creates these ready-to-go cocktails in small batches, with the best ingredients, testing at every step of the way. Their growing range includes everything from a Winter Cosmopolitan, to a Cherry Wood Rum Punch and even a Wild Berry Bramble (based on the blackberry-flavoured cocktail invented by bartender and former Islander Dick Bradsell). Online orders are delivered free across the Island, and if you’re thinking of placing one, we’d recommend the (vegan) Espresso Martini, made using a unique blend of hand-roasted coffee beans, created especially for the Isle of Wight Cocktail Co. by local caffeine connoisseurs Island Roasted. There’s also the Wight Lady Martini, a refreshing cocktail mixing premium gin, orange liqueur, sugar, and citrus — with an option for a 3-litre ’party pouch’ your nights in should be well and truly sorted for the foreseeable future. isleofwightcocktail.co.uk

If you follow the faint aroma of almonds across the undulating grassy slopes of Brading Down, you should end up at the gates of Adgestone Vineyard (with a bit of luck), where Russ, Philippa, and the rest of the team are busy making a new batch of their flavoured liqueurs. Not just a one-trick drink-maker, Adgestone handcrafts a range of five sweet and punchy spirit-based liqueurs, alongside the local wines that they’re better known for. Options include almond (described as ‘liquid marzipan in a bottle’), lemon, coffee, and a very smooth chocolate. There’s also a cherry version, rich and sweet, which can be mixed with the almond liqueur to make a delicious Cherry Bakewell flavoured after-dinner sipper. Whether you fancy drizzling them over ice cream or adding a glug to your latte, Adgestone’s 18% ABV liqueurs are available from the shelves of local farm shops, including Quarr Abbey, or from the vineyard’s very own website. adgestonevineyard.co.uk

Liqueurs from Adgestone Vineyard

The Winebulance

Matt Rogers is often described as a man with an uncanny ability to find wines that offer plenty of bang for their buck. So, who better to curate a doorstep delivery of handpicked wines, dropped off by their ’Winebulance’ (a.k.a. company van) which you may have seen weaving around the Island’s streets (no sirens, just delicious deliveries of wine). Founded during the pandemic, the Winebulance was thought up by Matt and business partner Mike Shorrock when their parent brand, Wight and Wessex Wines, temporarily lost its wholesale trade as a result of the many waves of lockdowns shutting their bar and restaurant customers. However, utilising their combined 39 years in the wine trade, the idea was an instant success and with 10% of profits going to the hospice, it does some good at the same time too. Ordering online, each box contains between three and six bottles, grouped by type, country of origin, or region — to make life a little easier. Sud France Sippers is made up of French white wines, Rioja N’Roll contains a trio of Spanish reds, and Strictly New Zealand includes a selection of Kiwi Sauvignon Blancs. Other options (from the current 57 choices available) include British Bubbles, Loire Lovers, Merlot Madness or Rhôneing Around... but whichever you go for, you can be sure Matt has included something extra special.

winebulanceiow.com

Mermaid Salt Vodka

Smooth, subtle and likened to a mermaid’s kiss. That’s how the experts describe the Isle of Wight Distillery’s sophisticated Mermaid Salt Vodka. Heading onto the distillery floor we see the next batch bubbling away, just awaiting a pinch of locally sourced sea salt before it’s blended with pure Isle of Wight spring water and bottled in cloudy white glassware. Handcrafted in small batches, this 40% ABV graindistilled vodka is especially enticing shaken into a Vesper Martini… and with an in-house recipe too good to keep to ourselves we’ve kindly shared it below.

VESPER MARTINI

Taste Dry with gentle citrus

Ingredients 60ml Mermaid Gin 20ml Mermaid Salt Vodka 15ml White Vermouth

Garnish A twist of lime peel

Method Shake all ingredients with ice and fine strain into a chilled glass, then garnish with a twist of lime zest.

Wine Therapy

The Short Story of Sir Richard Worsley’s Vineyard at Steephill

If you can’t stop yourself from buying the same bottle of red every single time, then step into Wine Therapy, an inviting, plum-coloured emporium at 28 High Street, Cowes, established (as it says above the door) “through the love of wine”. Inside you’ll find a sophisticated selection of wines from around the world, including from many lesser-known wine-producing nations, and with specialist sampling machines on standby, you can whet your whistle as you browse. Catching our eye on a quick sweep round the shelves is a bottle of Armenian ArmAs Karmrahyut (a red wine with notes of cranberry, cherries and plums). There’s also an Oumsiyat Soupir Rosé from the stunning Bekaa Valley of Lebanon and a tempting Tikveš Smederevka made by a Macedonian vineyard which first began in 1885. Heading out into the secluded courtyard wine garden, owners Terence and Nichola tell us more. “We always keep an eye out for the unusual, although never for its own sake. Being such a small shop, every wine really has to earn its place on our shelves and is tried and tested by us before we suggest our customers jump in there! Not all pretty or eye-catching labels and good price points make the grade, we’re not snobby about the wines we sell, but we are super-selective!” winetherapy.co.uk

In 1792, Sir Richard Worsley of Appuldurcombe House made plans for a vineyard, possibly one of the earliest the Island had ever seen. It would be in the grounds of his newly built house in the Undercliff, known as Sea Cottage — a grand seaside home close to Steephill Cove, with small classical temples constructed in the garden. He began with an acre of land, later growing to three, where he planted 700 vines both in rows across the ground and along stone-walled terraces. The grapes were from two varieties native to Brittany in the North West of France and supposedly produced a light white wine. Along with the vines, a French vinedresser was brought over too (some say he came from Brittany, others from neighbouring Anjou) and he was entrusted to oversee proceedings and supervise the experiment. Initial signs were promising, fruit even appeared on some plants earlier than anticipated and the vinedresser assured interested visitors “that he had never before seen such strong and prosperous young plants in any vineyard”. By the first years of the 1800s, when agricultural writer Charles Vancouver dropped by to see the vines he’d heard so much about, he was surprised to find the whole experiment abandoned. The vineyard had been turned to lawns and nothing more than a stretch of wall, five foot high, remained. Tracking down a former employee, it soon turned out that the vineyard had never been successful, even in its best years only producing small quantities of wine, described as having a “rough, inferior nature”. Many reasons were given for the project’s failure, including the vines being planted too close together, too close to the sea, or being too late a variety for the climate of the Isle of Wight. We also know Sir Richard himself was often absent, being appointed British ambassador to the Republic of Venice from 1794 to 1797, which can’t have helped during the vineyard’s first, crucial years.