Tonight I headed to City Winery in Tribeca to watch a country band called Yarn perform. And as an extra treat, the bar was serving something I’d never had before: Wine on tap.

City Winery, which has a long sweeping bar and neat wooden tables, is a slick-looking place, which seems a little at odds with the idea of wine on tap – something I thought sounded pretty grotty. But with a name like ‘City Winery’, you’d also assume they’d know what they’re doing.

Ryan, Lindsay and I opted for the Spring St. Pinot Noir and then marveled at the wine taps lined across the bar and the barrels stacked throughout the basement.

Because there’s no bottling involved with these wines, it means that they don’t need to be filtered – a process which can decrease its richness and give it an extra dryness. Avoiding bottling also means that there is no need for sulphites, which are usually used to keep bacteria at bay. Plus, no drops are lost like they can be in the bottling process, so it’s green too.

‘Basically our wines are closer to their true nature – raw,’ City Winery explains on its blog.

I’m sure the wine connoisseurs out there would taste the benefits or detriments of storing and pouring wine this way, but for me, it was simply fruity and tasty and delicious.

It slipped down a treat as we took in the music. First up was Rebecca Haviland in her duo, Whiskey Heart; I was a little put off by her using an electric guitar instead of an acoustic, especially as there were no drums, but her voice was unbelievable. She had me in a trance.

She was followed by a great acoustic then electric set by Yarn. These guys were so clean and had me toe-tapping. By the time the mandolin player was reaching for his tiny electric instrument for the second half, we were well on our way to a second carafe of the Pinot Noir – and I was itching for a dance. I just wish City Winery had cleared a dance floor.

While I’m not knowledgeable enough about wines to notice the subtle differences between the bottled and on-tap kinds, I can confirm that it was very, very delicious – and I liked how the bar allowed a new drinking experience, along with some brilliant music. Cheers!

P.s. I might have borrowed a couple of the pictures from the City Winery blog, which you can read here.