There’s nothing worse than missing out on a good time, but just because you may have slept on snagging tickets to the sold-out second annual What a Fizzer! – a sparkling wine bash at the Unicorn thrown by Newtown’s natty wine HQ, P&V Merchants – doesn’t mean you can’t be part of the fun.
This Saturday, November 30, a chunk of the Paddo pub’s upstairs will be open to the public all afternoon, so you rock up for a game of pool and pop a bottle of something from a specially curated “secret baller list” boasting rarities, B-sides and cult classics from minimal-intervention luminaries like Radikon, Frank Cornelissen and Gravner, all priced at retail cost. If you’re on the prowl for festive-season fizz (and who isn’t in early December?), a pop-up bottle shop spruiking pet-nats, grower Champagne and wild-ferment beer and cider from some of the producers and importers at the party will be on-hand, too.
Once the ticketed tasting officially wraps up at 5pm, DJ and winemaker Charlie Chux will be jumping on the ones and twos, and if last year is anything to go by, it’ll turn into one heck of a soirée. Winemakers tend to stick around, and usually need some help finishing whatever’s left over, so you should probably give them a hand. They don’t call it the silly season for nothing.
The Unicorn Hotel (106 Oxford St, Paddington 2021) opens the doors at 11am on Saturday, but the secret list and bottle shop will both be accessible from noon.
Need some BYO restaurant ideas for all those freshly bought bottles? Check out our list of the best BYO restaurants in Sydney.