The Restaurant Guide for Wine Lovers
The Art School
The Art School is Paul Askew's fine-dining restaurant in Liverpool, cooking an ambitious, produce-led modern British menu across prix fixe, tasting and vegan formats. Its wine programme is one of the most complete in the city — around 250 bins under a working sommelier, generous by the glass and by Coravin, and strong from grande marque Champagne right through to a full Sherry and Port tail. It will suit anyone who wants a serious cellar to explore over a special-occasion dinner, and who is happy to lean on the sommelier to get the best from it.
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El Gato Negro Tapas
Liverpool, North West England
Modern Spanish tapas
El Gato Negro is a modern Spanish tapas restaurant on Castle Street, cooking classic and contemporary small plates for sharing. Its wine programme is small but genuinely wine-led — independently sourced with a Master of Wine, and strongest in a dry-to-sweet sherry range that partners the food better than any house pour. It will suit anyone who enjoys eating and drinking their way across a table, and who is glad of sherry done properly.
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Southport, North West England
French and English brasserie
Auberge Brasserie is an accessible French-and-English brasserie in Southport with a French-led list that runs from house pours to village Burgundy and cru Beaujolais. The programme matches the cooking well and provides for the menu's hardest cured-fish plates by the glass, even if it neither signposts those matches nor stretches to a fortified or a proper dessert shelf. It will most suit the diner who wants dependable French classics and a fair glass alongside a brasserie meal, rather than one hunting a cellar to explore.
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