Vino Venue

Vino Venue Restaurant Review:

About the restaurant: Vino Venue houses the Atlanta Wine School, which offers classes for enthusiasts and professionals, and a private function space, a wine bar, a retail wine shop and a tapas lounge. Popular with the after-work crowd, the space has a number of seating styles, from high-top tables to cozy alcoves, and an upholstered conversation pit to a sidewalk patio ringed with large pots bearing plants.

Food & Drinks: The small-plates menu featuring wine-friendly fare, combined with several multi-unit self-service wine dispensers, creates the opportunity to tap into a variety of wine and food experiences. Explore grapes, wine-growing regions and types of wine (ports and dessert wines, for example) that may be unfamiliar, and all at various price points. While we've always admired the pimento cheese, we also liked the burrata with heirloom tomatoes, a portion sufficient for at least two people to share, or four if you're going on to other plates, such as a wild mushroom flatbread or the first-rate charcuterie board. For a main dish, target the salmon cooked to medium rare. Much of the menu is gluten-free, and there are vegetarian choices. When it comes to dessert, hope that a fruit-filled crostata is available. Beer-preferring patrons will find plenty to claim their attention, including local brews. Guests with nonalcoholic requirements will encounter appropriate quaffs. Coffee is robust and rewarding.