Spring Time, Diary Dates & Wine of the Month

Spring Comes Early

It appears that we have been blessed with an early Spring, not soon enough after the persistence of the rain recently. Stydd Gardens and the Glasshouse are in early bloom with jasmine & early roses already in flower, an the frog pond is alive with activity and is nurturing the first frogspawn!

Along with the sun came lots of people to visit us resulting in our busiest week of the year so far in our Wine Shack, thank you every one that visited us, and like this unexpected sunshine; long may it continue!

Dates for your Diary

-March 19th - 30th, the Wine Shed will be manned by Dario for this period and so times will be slightly limited to 5pm during the week, and closed for the next 2 Mondays & Tuesdays.

-Sunday 13th April - Stydd Gardens Food & Craft Market. After the popularity of our Christmas Markets, we are hosting a spring time event under cover in our vintage marquee. Entry is free to the public. We still have spaces for potential stall holders so please get in touch.

-Thursday 29th May - Grand Opening of Maureen Little's Bee Garden Plant Centre by Christine Walkden. Tickets are £35 which includes a glass of fizz and an afternoon tea buffet

-Tuesday 24th June - An afternoon with celebrated floral designer; Carle Wilde. Tickets are £35 which includes a glass of fizz and an afternoon tea buffet






Wine of the Month

This month we are introducing our "Wine of the Month", every month we will offer, by the glass, in both the Wine Shed & the Glass House our favourite wine of the moment; in an effort to assist in broadening your wine horizons and sample more of our range.

This month we have chosen a brilliant Malbec from Mendoza in Argentina, made by the Bianchi family of winemakers with grapes all grown organically.

Full-bodied and smooth, with subtle notes of coffee and bitter chocolate from the oak ageing add complexity to the bags of mature red fruit.

The take away bottle price is £13.50. Just ask for the "Wine of the Month".

10 Day Take Over

Lastly, myself and Andrea will be taking a long earned break from Wednesday 19th, we will return on Mothering Sunday. In the mean-time, Dario will be taking over in the shop, however this means that we will be closed for the next 2 consecutive Monday's and Tuesday's.

Stydd Gardens Christmas Markets, Free Tasters, Port & Blue Cheese, Mulled Wine & Mince Pies

Stydd Christmas Market

We would like you invite all to Stydd Gardens for our first ever Christmas Market in our beautiful marquee. We will have a whole host of festive food and drinks, crafts, gifts on offer throughout the day choose your magnificent Christmas Trees, Wreaths and Garlands to decorate your home.

After a week into your advent calendar, anticipation will be growing as the season to be jolly gets closer. Come along to find some inspiring and last minute Christmas gift ideas, choose your Christmas decorations or simply enjoy festive spirit offered by all of us at Stydd Gardens. It will be a market experience like no other!

Market opens at 10am until 4pm
Saturday 7th December (Festivities continue into Sunday the 8th too!)
Stydd Gardens, Stoneygate Lane, Ribchester
More details; Stydd Gardens Xmas Fair & Market

Free Tasters

We have changed the tasting table this week a few things we think compliment the season and should be great with your Roast Dinner, whatever the centrepiece!

We have a Dry Riesling made by winemaker Dr Ernst Loosen of Villa Wolf winery, Pfalz, Germany. The medium bodied depth of flavour from the typical stone fruits; apricot, peach and nectarine should match your starters of smoked salmon & lighter Christmas main event, particularly Roasted Turkey! At £9.50; this is superb value for money from an exemplary wine and winemaker!

Next up is a single varietal Grenache from Willunga 100, the cherry, strawberry red fruit flavours in amongst the hints of spice and dried herbs and light footed tannins will enhance juicy beef dinner without overpowering the all the trimmings. All your Christmas' coming in at once when you pick this up for only £9.95

Come and try these great wines in the shop now and tell us what you think.

Port & Cheese

No Christmas is complete without the traditional warming little nip of Port. We have brought in some spectacular examples from Quinta da Romaneira; the range includes the 2007 Late Bottled Vintage, a 10 Year Old Tawny and the stunning 2008 Vintage.

We have added Port and Blue Cheese to our "Light Bites" special menu board for you to experience why together they are such an iconic match for the festive season; indulge yourself!

Our last festive treat for you in this installment is our homemade mulled wine and mince pies, both are sublime; we use our Berry Box blended South African red wine as a base along with seasonal spices concocted in our special way to give a full, thick, warming mulled wine. The mince pies are lovingly produced by one of our favorite regulars from the village, Nicola Fry. A thin pastry base with a broad lattice makes for full flavour whilst being light enough for you to indulge without spoiling your Roast Dinner!

Remember we have loads of gift ideas, hampers, vouchers, wine giftware, private functions & tasting evenings; even the incredible vintage exposed filament lighting adding lovely cosy spirit to the cabin!

With seasons greetings its farewell for now, we cant wait to see you soon and share what we have on offer!

Ben & Andrea

Tapas & Wine, Stonyhurst Gift Fair, Lighting in the Press, A Full House & Discovering English Fizz

What an incredible week!

This is the busiest we have been since prior to opening, and trust me that is definitely saying something!

Spanish Tapas and Wine evening

Thursday saw the highly anticipated event featuring food, drink and music from and by the excellent Joe Botham & team at Levanter Fine Foods. 

Starting with the refreshing Ferret Cava Especial and Banderillas, Pork Meatballs followed accompanied by our Izadi White Rioja, Gambas Pil Pil were washed down with Herencia Altes Garnatxa Blanca, Jamon Serrano & Iberico complimented the Pruno from Ribeiro Del Duero, with the impressive Flor de Vetus Verdejo washing down the excellent chicken and seafood Paella. My mouth is watering once again just in memory of it all!!

Enormous thanks go out to Levanter for their part in creating an authentic & wonderfully enjoyable atmosphere, we even managed to re-create the Spanish summertime weather in October here in the Ribble Valley!

The Autumn Gift Fair at Stonyhurst College

This weekend Stonyhurst College hosted their popular Gift Fair and was the perfect opportunity for us to showcase some of the Gift Hampers we have put together, lots of local fare goes into the themed packages such as a Chocoholic Hamper, the Chilli-holic hamper, a Bowland Brewery Hamper, and our exclusive festive hamper including a fabulous 10 year Tawny Port, Blacksticks Blue Cheese and Christmas Pudding made by our amazing cake partner Lisa Marie Cakes of Longridge. 

For those who made it to the show and signed up at the Live Ribble Valley Stand; you will have witnessed the most amazing cake creation I have certainly ever seen around these parts, whilst also entering the draw (to be made very soon) to win a celebration cake and fizz worth in excess of £200! 

We also made some new friends; Emma Bailie from Aged in Oak, based in Garstang, provided a professional tasting demonstration and showcased some equally excellent wines. It was great to share and compare our exploits and experiences with fellow local wine independent merchants, we wish you every success and very much hope to catch up again soon, we can't wait to visit your shop!

A Full House

Upon returning from a busy day on the stand and with the ever popular Peter stepping into our shoes in our absence we were greeted by a bustling shop of smiling faces and chinking glasses, it was fantastic to witness our busiest weekend so far and so thank you all for coming; familiar faces and new, I hope you all enjoyed the evening and hope to see you again soon!

Lighting in the Press

Once again thank you to at Live Magazine for the choosing Fullaloves Vintage Lighting as an editorial piece for the fabulous interiors edition this month, it has generated a great deal of interest in what is quite unique but wildly sought after ambient lighting, especially poignant given the clock change over the weekend!

Discover English Sparkling Wine

For those who are eager to learn of our next event, pen in the Friday 22nd of November into your diaries as we sample some of the finest of English Fizz. The local Michael Bush from Nyetimber will be hosting an evening to tell us how the English wine industry is hot on the heels of our legendary neighbours in Champagne, and arguably even topping the tables for fizz the world over. It has even won over our own Royal family to switch to home grown grapes as their celebratory tipple. Canapes will match the various styles of wines produced by Nyetimber to give you some inspiration as we tentatively mull over what to buy for the festive celebrations!  

Spaces will be limited to around 30 for this event get in early if you would like to join us. Keep a look out on here, the forthcoming newsletter or on Facebook for more information to come this week.

Autumn Farmers Market at Stydd Gardens

This is somewhat last minute; but in case you are at a loose end this weekend, our neighbours in the Glass House are hosting a Harvest Market in our marquee.

This event is to showcase the wonderful suppliers that make up the fabulous menu on offer within the Glass House and sample their wares first hand, meeting the people who make such fantastic local produce.
There will be meats, cheeses, honey, breads chutneys and of course wines to try.

We are also setting up stall to introduce our forthcoming gift hampers in anticipation of the festive spirit; examples will be on offer and available to order for any future date.

There is no entry fee to the markets; so just pop along anytime between 10am until 3pm