References

…by all accounts, the Sybarites pursued the sensual pleasures of life,

and those of wine and olive oil, knowing of the “positive” effect it had on

their sexual health 1 ...

Sybarite Cellars™

The Sybarites of ancient Greece were seekers of life's greatest pleasures and sensuous luxuries which undoubtedly extended to drinking fine wines. Sybarite Cellars was born to reflect our shared love for wine (occasionally enjoying it a little too much), but our main intention has always been to find and enjoy sophisticated terroir reflecting and sensual pleasuring wines.

A good wine should enhance the conversation, make you feel more eloquent

than you really are, and bring you closer to your interlocutor!

Sybarite Cellars

Sybarite Cellars specialises in Italian, German and French wines, with a spattering of champagnes and other interesting wines and spirits from around the world.

We are able to supply fine wines, champagnes and sloe & damson gins / vodkas directly to you personally, the shoot / river for your day, or straight to a lodge or hotel, where you maybe staying.

Please give us a call on +44 (0) 20 7233 7798 to discuss any wine requirements that you may have.

Sloe & Damson Gin-Vodka

For many years we have made sloe gin, from ripe sloe berries picked after the first frost of winter, and we still do, but we can’t produce enough for demand - therefore we have to supplement our home preoccupation, with sloe and damson gin-vodka made by others...

HISTORY

The England and Wales Enclosure Acts of the 17th century, in many ways was responsible for the first history of sloe gin. The Enclosure Acts transformed open common land into individual farmsteads and properties, whereby hedgerows were laid to form a natural fencing.

Blackthorn, amongst other hedging plant varieties, was and still is used today to establish hedgerows due to its dense, spiny branches. The consequences of these new hedgerows were new, bumper crops of sloe berries.

Sloes on their own are notoriously tart and astringent, and country living folk soon learned that the best way to take advantage of these berries, as with so many things in life, was to add alcohol.

It was in the later stages of the 19th century, when more established distilleries began to produce their own sloe gin, when sloe gin’s revival began. But it was the beginning of the 20th century when cocktail bartenders began to take notice - 1920s was Waldorf-Astoria in New York City use sloe gin in the Charlie Chaplin cocktail, and 1960s was the famous sloe gin cocktail The Sloe Gin Fizz popularised.

The Story of one Galtem the Guzzler...

This is the story of one Galtem the Guzzler, a backwoods purveyor

of wine. It seems that one day he bought an odd lot of merchandise

that included five barrels of Barolo and a barrel of Chianti.

Galtem, historically from Tuscany, kept the barrel of Chianti and sold

off the Barolo. Part of the Barolo he sold to the owner of an old wine

bar in Piedmont and ’twice that amount’ to banker Rumport,

a connoisseur of fine wine. This finished off the five barrels of Barolo.

None of the barrels had to be opened for these transactions.

The barrels were clearly marked with the number of gallons each contained.

How many gallons of Chianti?

How many gallons were sold to the bar in Piedmont?