Little Holiday Wine Tour: Stockholm

Discover an urban winery in Stockholm 🍇, French classics 🍷, meatballs with a glass Chablis 🍾 & a relaxed wine tasting bar 🤩.

Stockholm in Sweden 🇸🇪 might not be the first place to think of when it comes to wine 🤔. Yet, as UnscrewMe are big Stockholm fans 👍, we visited earlier this year and wanted to share some of our discoveries we’ve made there ☑️.

When it comes to wine 🍷, Stockholm is an increasingly exciting place. We are planning to write more about our Stockholm wine favourites that we found over the years soon. For today, we are focusing on our latest trip.

Expanding from where we started when we explored the Urban Winery trend in London, we had our eyes set on The Winery Hotel 🍇. We also thought the lovely Café Nizza earned a place on this list with an outstanding wine selection 🍷 and impeccable service. Finally, we managed to check out the established Bakfickan next to the Royal Swedish Opera and enjoyed a refreshing glass of wine with “smakliga” meatballs 🍾. As little bonus listing, we also include Dryck Vinbar in hip Södermalm 🤩.

Making the most of being in Stockholm, it’s always worth checking out ⭐️ Star Wine List and especially their excellent list of the 20 best wine bars in Stockholm 📍. Even better is that by now, they also branched out beyond Stockholm into a couple of other cities, including London.

Enough general information, here are our latest Stockholm wine bar recommendations, cheers! 🍾

🍇 The Winery Hotel, Solna, Brunnsviken Lake

• Name: The Winery Hotel (⭐️ on Star Wine List)
• Location: Brunnsviken lake, Solna. Located right by the beautiful Brunnsviken lake, a short commuter train ride from the city centre and not all that far from where I used to live, around the other side of the lake.
• Background: When looking up urban wineries from around the world 🌎 to prepare for our London urban winery tasting, we came across The Winery Hotel in Stockholm (as well as Wine Mechanics in Gothenburg). This new urban winery in Stockholm immediately made it on the list of places we wanted to visit the next time we would go back to Stockholm ☑️. So naturally, once we had arrived in Stockholm, we planned a trip to Solna 🚈.
  The interior design is great and they offer a good selection of wines by the glass. The options include their own bottles and a couple of other standard international wines, all available through so called “Vinomats” 🤖, wine dispensers. Even better than the wine selection is that on a nice day, you can go up to the roof terrace and enjoy the view 😎.
• Wine Picks:
  2017 The Winery Red by The Winery Hotel from Stockholm in Sweden 🇸🇪 made with grapes from Tuscany in Italy 🇮🇹. Produced just meters from where I tasted it, The Winery Hotel trucks mainly Sangiovese and a few Cabernet Sauvignon grapes 🍇 in from Italy and the processes them on-site in Stockholm.
  The naming isn’t always entirely clear, I did enjoy the 2017 vintage more than what they call “Blend #4”. The wine was fruity with flavours of fresh red berries like strawberries and also cherries. A hint of smoke and oak was nicely balanced, overall it was a wholesome enjoyable glass.
  2016 Chianti Classico DOCG by Terreno from Tuscany in Italy 🇮🇹 . As comparison to their wine produced in Stockholm, I also had a sip of their full-on Italian wine. Labelled as “vino biologico”, the wine is based Sangiovese matured in large botti oak barrels and Merlot matured in smaller barrique oak barrels. For my taste, the wine could easily age for a couple of more years ⏳. The dark fruit and cherry notes were complemented by distinct oak flavours.
  While personally, I might not be the biggest fan of their style, this wine was named 🏅 “Sweden’s best organic red wine” at Vinordic Wine Challenge in 2017, a competition organised by Stockholmsmässan and the Swedish wine magazine 📰 “Allt om Vin” as part of the GastroNord trade show.
• Tastings: With wine tastings and guided tours, The Winery Hotel is definitely worth a visit. Or just enjoy the view and do your own little tasting.

🍷 Café Nizza, Södermalm, Katarina-Sofia

• Name: Café Nizza (⭐️ on Star Wine List)
• Location: Katarina-Sofia, Södermalm. Café Nizza is in a quiet and relaxed neighbourhood . If you are wondering what else you could do in the area, the restaurant is not very far from the Fotografiska museum and gallery 📸, which is always worth a visit with its changing exhibitions.
• Background: Café Nizza looked great from the outside and it turns out, it is an even nicer place once you’re in. The wine selection is impressive with a strong focus on French classics and the food is outstanding 😋. Amongst plenty of other things, I greatly enjoyed a duck breast, well-seasoned with crispy skin, flavourful jus and crispy potato on the side.
• Wine Picks:
  Bourgogne Blanc “Les Champlains” by Domaine Simon Bize & Fils from Côte-d’Or, Burgundy in France 🇫🇷 . A great example of a white Burgundy wine, made mainly from Chardonnay grapes with a little bit of Pinot Gris, grown just outside Savigny-lès-Beaune. “Les Champlains” tastes classy and elegant, to my surprise also a bit refreshing 😊. I did like it more while it was still cooler, when it showed some nice mineral notes besides the trademark buttery and creamy character with a hint of mature oak.
  I kept it throughout my dinner and went back to it every now and then. At some point, it smelled like yogurt, later more sweetness poured out and it ended with a nutty and creamy taste.
  Although I am not fuzzy about pairings, this wine went exquisitely with the starter of chanterelles mushrooms with egg yolk.
  2018 Babette by Domaine Benjamin Taillandier from Minervois in Languedoc, France 🇫🇷 . Moving on from the white, I enjoyed an interesting red from the South of France. It was a balanced wine with a dark fruit and sour cherry character with white pepper notes and some bubblegum smell in the nose.
  The wine really worked a treat with the cheese board 🧀, complementing especially the salty Roquefort cheese perfectly.
  This wine turns out to be a bit of a challenge to pin down. It is named after Café Nizza’s sister restaurant in Stockholm, 📍 Babette. Based on producer and label, it seems to be a variant of the wine the producer labels as “Laguzelle”, which is a blend of predominantly Cinsault grapes with a small percentage of Syrah and Carignan. I find the description by Rachel Signer very much on point: “simply pleasurable to drink” and “alive, fresh, just a bit complex, and excellent with food”. An easy-drinking red wine 😍 made without oak, just as I like it.
  2006 Bordeaux Supérieur by Château Vieux Mougnac from Saint-Emilion in Bordeaux, France 🇫🇷 . We also had the pleasure of tasting a smooth Bordeaux red based on 80% Merlot with 15% Cabernet Franc and 5% Cabernet Sauvignon. Slightly too much oak for my taste, but nevertheless a great wine that certainly pairs well with food 🍽.
• Tastings: My recommendation would be to ask for any specials and be prepared for some delicious surprises.

🍾 Bakfickan, Norrmalm, Kungsträdgården

• Name: Bakfickan at Operakällaren
• Location: Kungsträdgården, Norrmalm. You can’t be much more in the centre of Stockholm. The Opera House 🎭 next to the restaurant is just across the bridge from the Royal Palace 🏰 in Gamla Stan, the “Old City”. If you walk a few meters down, following the road along the water, the next bridge leads right to the Swedish Parliament 💼.
• Background: Operakällaren is one of those destinations that I had on my list for years ⚠️. Finally, I made it to Bakfickan, like the side show of the main restaurant. I couldn’t have asked for a nicer plate of Swedish meatballs in the summer sun! ☀️
• Wine Picks:
  2017 Chablis by Domaine des Hâtes from Burgundy in France 🇫🇷. An excellent and refreshing white wine with lovely mineral notes and great fruit flavours.
  On the website of wine merchant Lea & Sandeman, I learned that the 2017 vintage by the young winemaker Pierrick Laroche is special with high concentration and intensity.
• Tastings: Admittedly, the wine list by the glass at Bakfickan is relatively short, but the newly opened Nobis Wine Cellar 🍾 should offer a much wider selection, a place I will definitely check out on my next visit.

🤩 Dryck Vinbar, Södermalm, Mariatorget

• Name: Dryck Vinbar (⭐️ on Star Wine List)
• Location: Mariatorget, Södermalm. A very nice neighbourhood ⛲️ with plenty of coffee shops ☕️ such as Drop Coffee and bakeries 🍪. like Fabrique Stenugnsbageri and Bageri Petrus throughout the day, and a couple of bars at night 🍸.
• Background: had the pleasure of staying in the area repeatedly over the past few years 🙌. As I was getting back to my Airbnb one evening, I decided to briefly stop at Dryck Vinbar to relax over a glass from a busy day of running around town 👣, before heading back to London the next day 🛫. The wine selection by the glass was way above average. not only for a wine bar in Stockholm. 👍
• Wine Picks:
  2018 Albariño “Albamar” by Bodegas Albamar from Rías Baixas in Galicia, Spain 🇪🇸 . A balanced Albariño with floral notes combined with green fruits and white peach, refreshing and tasty.
• Tastings: The don’t just have a long wine list, they also run regular wine tastings 🗓 with plenty of different themes. If you’re in Stockholm, this seems like a good to discover some wines.

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Plenty of things have been keeping us busy. Now as things have gotten a bit quieter, we’re working on more articles to shed some light onto our current projects and activities.

(It took a while, but thanks to excellent coffee at newly opened Kiss the Hippo Coffee in Fitzrovia, the always reliable Kaffeine, some lunch-break writing at Bliss Coffee in Wimbledon and a tasty steak at Flat Iron near King’s Cross, we’ve now finished our first Stockholm article. While our focus is firmly on London, we will share a few more Stockholm and other holiday discoveries to mix things up a bit.)