Wine Shopping in Astoria

Every now and again it really is good to shake things up.  My friend David lives in Astoria, which I had visited a few years back when my friend keith lived there.  At that time it seemed sleepy and most Greek, not any more!  WOW is all I can say, what a diverse happening neighborhood filled with everything from locally roasted hipster hang outs with kick ass grilled cheese to awesome Indian places (with $5 glasses of wine).  I'm not really going to speak much about the restaurant scene so much at the moment, David and I went for Indan food at Seva on 34th street in a nice little room, simple, with really good food, great service that was very reasonably priced.  

On my way to the Steinway subway station I asked David to take me to the wine store he buys wine at when he comes to dinner.  he is always bringing some obscure Greek or Sicilian wine that is very tasty.

Broadway Wine and Liquor is just an old fashioned store front Ma and Pa liquor/wine store, what makes it different is who it caters to.  Or maybe it would be better to say who it doesn't cater to... the shelves are stocked with wine from Romania, Croatia, Greece, and Bulgaria...when was the last time you drank a Bulgarian Syrah?

And don't think they only have weird Eastern European wine, the picture below is a very nice bottle of Italian.  I say very nice because it's $25 and has a kick ass label, but I've never sampled it.  Too bad about the name though....

 Romanian Pinot anyone?

The thing about this place is that yeah they have some good Italian wines, a fair selection of Californian stuff, hell you can even buy a bottle of Opus One if you want, but why would when you have a whole world of wine available here that you aren't likely to find in the boutique wine shops of Manhattan.