BEAUNE'S WINE BAR: 2009 N. 22ND STREET TAMPA FLORIDA 33605 (813) 241-8587
HOURS OF OPERATION: THURSDAY, FRIDAY & SATURDAY 5:00PM-MIDNIGHT, FREE ON SITE PARKING

BEAUNE'S (PRONOUNCED "BONES") IS THE CAPITAL CITY OF BURGUNDY, FRANCE & A WINE LOVERS PARADISE BOTH HERE AND THERE!

How many times have you gotten to a restaurant only to realize that the wine list seems like an afterthought, and the pricing is an onslaught! Beaune's Wine Bar is Tampa's "refuge" for wine lovers. With over 1000 selections to choose from with NO RESTAURANT MARKUP and the finest selection of cured meats, cheeses and pates, why would you go anywhere else? But don't take my word for it. See what the critics have to say!

Our latest review was by the The Tampa Bay Times!!!
TAMPABAY TIMES
Jessica Brady

The spot: Beaune's Wine Bar is a classy yet comfy lounge perfect for a first date or an intimate night with friends. Patrons can choose to sit at tables or relax in sleek leather couches and chairs with plush pillows. A long wooden bar stretches across the room, offering a nice spot to mingle. The low lights and tawny-colored walls compliment the old brick building and posh European decor. A long curtain divides an area for private parties and an attached wine store. There are no TVs and the indirect lighting gives the perfect atmosphere for relaxation. Everything is exceptionally clean and polished. Prime location: Like a needle in a haystack, Beaune's Wine Bar blends in with the other brick buildings a few blocks north of Ybor City. Unless you're paying close attention, you can easily pass the dark corner where it's located. But, parking is not a problem. Beaune's has its own fenced, illuminated parking, which is nice because it gives some peace of mind while sipping a glass of wine. The crowd: Diverse is the best way to describe the crowd at Beaune's. A love for wine brings together people in their mid '20s and older from all cultures and classes. Everyone was respectful and unobtrusive, flashing an occasional smile across the room. Juice: Unless you're in the mood for wine, this isn't the place to visit. The wine list is a well-catalogued roster of mostly European import wines. All wines are moderately priced, so almost anyone is able to enjoy a glass or bottle. If the wines on the list don't please your palate, you'll be able to go into the store and pick out a bottle. Tours of the wine cellar add a nice touch to a mellow evening. Music: Music can make or break even the most perfect of atmospheres, but the right volume of soothing jazz sets the right mood. There's no live music yet, but there is talk of a possible baby grand piano in the corner.

Grub: The menu is simple, with a wide variety of cheese and meat platters to seafood hors d'oeuvre all accompanied by a basket of bread with herb dip, dried fruit, nuts, olives and pickles. Pretty much everything needed to enhance the flavor of any wine. It all starts at $11. The menu also consists of several entrees with a weekly chef special and for dessert, a ricotta cheesecake or flourless chocolate cake.

 

BEAUNE'S WINE BAR
CHRIS SHERMAN: ST PETE TIMES REVIEW

This dusty old gold Ybor City warehouse is a most industrial wine store, with exposed brick, endless racks, private cellar space and tasting tables. And now it hides a very clubby wine bar. At a bar of polished wine crates, in leather armchairs and at black-draped tables, wooden platters are piled with rare cheeses and sturdy charcuterie meats and glasses filled with finer wines. Wines by the glass are smart, but bottles are smarter. A quick pick list includes sparkling and Rhones in every price range - $20, under $50, under $100 and Old & Rare - plus good Burgundy and Bordeaux back to '95 in the last two categories. Food has the same pedigree: fourme d'Ambert, old Gouda and two dozen more cheeses, ; nine salamis; prosciutto and pate, or entrees of shrimp and venison. A very rare vintage of sophisticated fare in Ybor.

Menu: Cheese and meat platters latters of meat and cheese, $11 to $24; entrees, $15 to $45. Wine list: 30 labels by the glass or 800labels by the bottle. Pricing: $5 to $20 by the glass

WINE LIBRARY.COM REVIEW:
I'm not sure if you have been there yet but there is a great new wine bar in Ybor City called Beaune's Wine Bar which is part of West Palm Wines at the southeast corner of 22nd St. and Palm Ave. Its a little off the beaten path from the main strip along 7th Avenue but its a great place. They have some wine by the glass but their major selling point is you buy a bottle from their retail store or wine cellar and drink it there with no mark up or corkage. They have a great selection of bordeaux and burgundy and the menu, although small, is wonderful and very wine friendly (cheese platters, foie gras, carpaccio, escargot). Check out their website: http://www.westpalmwines.com/ BTW, the wines listed on their site are only a small portion of what they have.  

St Pete Times Review!

THREE STARS! YBOR CITY — Very few restaurants in the Tampa Bay area have been granted Wine Spectator's Best of Award of Excellence. Nine, to be precise, Bern's, Bob Heilman's, Forlini's, Island Way Grill, Tio Pepe, Charley's, Columbia, SideBern's and Beaune's, with Bern's going one better with the magazine's Grand Award, the highest honor. In large measure, these places make for fancy, get-your-car-washed kinds of nights out. What if there was one where you could have a delicious $7.95 lunch, accompanied by a $3 glass of wine or even a bottle from that award-winning list, priced at just $10 more than retail?

Beaune's Wine Bar at West Palm Wines is that place. Beaune's (pronounced "bones," after the city in Burgundy) opened for weekday lunch about two months ago, quietly adding one of the most affordable and delightful lunches in Ybor City. Jim Sirna's wine shop has been a go-to place for local oenophiles since it opened 10 years ago. The wine bar was added three years ago to give wine lovers a place to linger in the evenings over steamed mussels ($13.95), buttery escargots ($11.95) or coq au vin ($18.95).

The shop itself is inauspicious from the outside, a blocky "open to the public" sign and a fenced parking lot seeming somehow ominous. But wine lovers have found their way here from all over, collectors enthusiastic about Sirna's level-headed approach to value and price. Sirna, who once worked at New York's Le Cirque, was the wine buyer for Morrell & Company before launching his own venture.

Mark Lasky, an Italian wine nut, manages the wine store, while Paddy Handley, runs the kitchen.  

The dining room is pretty, with black slipcovered parsons chairs, black linens and warm-gold pendant lamps hanging down over a gleaming bar inset with planks from wooden wine boxes. The soundtrack? Live Grateful Dead shows. Certainly out of left field, but Jerry and the boys add a level of festivity to an afternoon.

Spend a little time hanging out at Beaune's and wine talk is unavoidable. There are six to eight reds and whites poured each day by the glass, whim of the house, but it doesn't take much to get them to uncork something exciting. I managed to get a sip of a 2005 Manincor Réserve del Conte from Alto Adige, a gorgeous Bordeaux-ish blend with a dash of some crazy grape called Lagrein. This wine and others will be featured in a Manincor wine dinner on Oct. 8 at the wine bar, four courses plus wines for $50 per person.

West Palm Wines is hardly undiscovered among wine aficionados, but Beaune's is a welcome Ybor treat.

Laura Reiley can be reached at lreiley@sptimes.com or (727) 892-2293. Her blog, the Mouth of Tampa Bay, is at www.blogs.tampabay.com/dining.

 Reiley dines anonymously and unannounced. The Times pays all expenses. Advertising has nothing to do with selection for review or the assessment.

Review Beaune's Wine Bar at West Palm Wines 2009 N 22nd St., Tampa (813) 241-8587
Cuisine: French
Beaune's Wine Bar: Dinner: Thursday, Friday & Saturday 5:00pm till 11:00pm
Details: Amex, V, MC, Disc.; reservations accepted; beer and wine
Prices:Dinner $8.95 to $39.95
Rating out of four stars:
Food: ★★★
Service: ★★★
Atmosphere: ★★
Overall: ★★★
Review key:
★★★★ Extraordinary   ★★★Excellent   ★★ Good   ★ Fair