Sub Rosa Bakery is located at 620 N. 25th St. and begins wine service on Sunday, May 14. This Saturday and Sunday, May 5 and 6, the biweekly Sub Rosato wine bar pop-up launches, serving wine and gourmet snacks from 5 to 11 p.m. (Photo by Stephanie Breijo)
There's more to Sub Rosa Bakery's heirloom-grain loaves than the simple word "bread" conveys. Owners Evrim and Evin Dogu imbue tireless effort into milling grain, maintaining their wood-fired oven and painstakingly laminating dough to create the bakery's renowned pastries from a sunny corner of Church Hill. Naturally, when it came time to incorporate wine into the mix, the brother-and-sister team wanted a program that would not only complement their menu but suit their thoughtful, small-batch sensibilities.
"I was like, 'How have I not extended the same consideration that I have of every edible thing in my life to wine?' " Evrim says.
As such, you'll find two noteworthy wine events at the bakery this month: This weekend is the launch of Sub Rosato — a semi-permanent wine bar pop-up, to be held in the space every other week — and on Sunday, May 14, Sub Rosa launches its by-the-glass wine menu, with bottles available to go.
"[In both] there'll be an emphasis on natural wines that showcase the process and smaller, more-focused wines than you would [typically] be able to find," says Evrim. "Unfortunately, many people are under the impression that many wines are just fermented grapes, and unfortunately, it's not like that."
On Saturday and Sunday, as soon as the bakery completes normal service at 5 p.m., the Sub Rosato pop-up will begin pouring wines made by organic and/or smaller producers who prefer minimal intervention, highlighting the wine's terroir or specific fruit. The wine list will feature two tiers with red, white, rosé and sparkling options, with 4-ounce pours at about $6 and roughly $10 to reflect the change in complexity between the two levels. A third tier will showcase a rare or unique selection, such as a wine flight from a single producer, "something you'd be highly unlikely to find by the glass anywhere," says Virginia Samsel, formerly of Saison and Saison Market. She's one of a handful of oenophiles behind the Sub Rosato concept, which is based just as much on a relaxed atmosphere as it is on product.
"Wine is precious, but it's only as precious as your experience with it," says Samsel. "If you come week to week, it'll be familiar because it's a familiar place, but it'll be different every time." Should you enjoy one of the evening's pours, the team will most likely offer bottle sales, and if not, can point you in the direction of where to find them. Sub Rosato will also feature light food pairing by way of bread and farro crackers made by Sub Rosa, and charcuterie, head cheese and pâté from JM Stock Provisions.
Separately, on Mother's Day, Sub Rosa will roll out its new daily wine menu. "It's basically what Sub Rosa would do if we were making wine: care with sourcing, and mostly wild yeasts," says Evrim. "All of the wines that we'll have here will be working with wild yeasts and no added sugars and often no added sulfur; just fermented grapes."
Sub Rosa's wine list will always offer a rotating selection of red, white, rosé, sparkling, cider and maybe a "wildcard" wine, ideally cycling through them all quickly at $5 to $7 per glass to allow for guests' continual exposure to new names and styles. The bakery now holds an On- and Off-Premise ABC license, so you'll be able to purchase bottles of wine to go with your bread and pastries whenever you visit.
"I think that [Richmond] is still really behind other cities, and also especially Europe, in terms of taking a kind of thoughtful approach, and I think that one of the reasons why is because wine is unfortunately so elite-seeming already that it makes it seem there's another layer," says Evrim, who's dreamt of offering wine since the bakery's beginnings. "So we're hoping to present it in a way that says, 'This isn't another layer; it's just another way of doing it.' It's the same way we do our bread: We try to say, 'this is worth it,' but not be too precious about it. Same thing with the wines."
Sub Rosa Bakery is located at 620 N. 25th St. and begins wine service on Sunday, May 14. This Saturday and Sunday, May 5 and 6, the biweekly Sub Rosato wine bar pop-up launches, serving wine and gourmet snacks from 5 to 11 p.m. Follow Sub Rosato on Facebook for information about future events.
