Nashville Wine Bars: Five Places to Sit with a Glass

A seated glass of wine in Nashville can come with a sweet crêpe, housemade bread or Spanish tapas, without turning into dinner. Choose the accompaniment and setting that suit your evening: The Authentique puts French wine alongside crêpes, while the other stops offer a bread house, a converted church, a Victorian-house parlor and an Edgehill patio.

A glass of wine and something to eat

Wine bar	Area	Glass and food order	Typical spend per person	Weekly closing days
The Authentique	East Nashville	Bernard Baudry Chinon 2022 + Citron (sugar-and-lemon crêpe)	$20–30	Sunday and Monday
Butterlamp Bread & Beverage	East Nashville	Glass of wine + warm bread with cultured butter	$20–30	Tuesday and Wednesday
Bad Idea	East Nashville	Artisan wine by the glass + light bite	$25–40	—
Parlor Wine Bar	East Nashville	Glass of wine + light bite	$20–35	None
Barcelona Wine Bar	Edgehill	Spanish wine by the glass + patatas bravas (potatoes with spicy sauce)	$20–30	None

The best choice depends on what you want beside your wine. Pick The Authentique for French wine and a sweet finish, Butterlamp for bread, Bad Idea for artisan wines and Lao-leaning food, Parlor for a house-and-porch setting, or Barcelona for Spanish wine and tapas.

The first four are in East Nashville, across the Cumberland River from downtown. Barcelona is in Edgehill, southwest of downtown. Choose a neighbourhood that fits your outing rather than making a bar crawl.

A higher-priced glass or several dishes will move you towards the top of the estimates or beyond them. At Parlor, sharing a pizza instead of having a light bite typically brings one glass and food to about $25–40 each for two people.

Start with a glass rather than a bottle. Ask for seats together and reserve where offered if a group needs a fixed arrival time. These accompaniments are snacks rather than dinner, so choose Nashville restaurants for a full meal if that is what your appetite calls for.

The Authentique

The Authentique is French owned and operated, and its combination of French wine and sweet crêpes gives you a clear reason to stop without ordering dinner. You can sit down for wine and a snack, making it a good fit for a sweet accompaniment rather than a savoury plate.

The Loire choice in the table is a Chinon, a red-wine appellation associated with Cabernet Franc. If you are unsure which glass suits your taste, say whether you prefer a lighter red or a white, then choose before ordering your crêpe. The sweet option keeps the food order simple rather than building a meal around several courses.

The Authentique describes its crêpes as made from a cherished grandmother’s recipe. You can enjoy the sweet selection as the entire food part of your visit, rather than adding it after a full meal.

Butterlamp Bread & Beverage

Butterlamp Bread & Beverage makes housemade bread the focus of a seated wine stop. Its menu includes konbu sourdough, meaning kelp sourdough, as a full or half loaf. Choose the separate warm-bread order for a snack with your glass rather than ordering a loaf.

Order wine and food at the counter, then take an available seat. Seating is first come, first served, so this is the exception to planning a group visit around a reservation. Full service may be available at the few counter seats, but elsewhere you should expect to order at the bar.

The small indoor space can fill up. A grassy patio with tables gives you an outdoor alternative when the weather allows, and wine with bread can be the whole outing. Choose the lawn if you want to sit outside rather than counting on indoor seats for everyone.

Bad Idea

Bad Idea pairs artisan wines and Lao-leaning food in a converted church, giving this East Nashville stop a setting quite different from a conventional bar room. Choose it when the wine itself is the main interest and you want a small plate alongside it.

Its wine programme has received a Michelin Guide American South Sommelier Award, a distinction for wine service rather than a reason to commit to a full dinner. Tell the team what styles you enjoy and how adventurous you want your glass to be.

Head for the bar or lounge for a walk-in wine-and-light-bite visit. Both have seating suited to sipping without a full dinner order. Reserve if you want a table instead. Expect an upscale outing, and choose a modest food accompaniment if you want to keep the visit focused on wine.

Parlor Wine Bar at Urban Cowboy

Parlor Wine Bar at Urban Cowboy occupies a Victorian-style house with a porch, making the setting the reason to choose this stop. Settle into the parlor or onto the porch for a glass and a light bite, rather than treating the visit as a restaurant dinner.

You do not need to be staying at Urban Cowboy to use Parlor. Use the bar entrance and follow the access instructions on arrival. Interior guest areas are separate and may require a code, so entry to the wine bar is not an invitation to explore the accommodation.

If your appetite grows, the bar can arrange Roberta’s pizza as a more substantial option. Sharing one changes both the amount of food and the spending, as reflected in the estimate above. Pepperoni rolls belong to Urban Cowboy’s Public House menu, not Parlor, so do not arrive expecting them as your wine-bar snack.

Barcelona Wine Bar

Barcelona Wine Bar is the Edgehill choice for Spanish wine with tapas and the option of patio seating. A glass and a small plate can be your whole order, so you need not turn a stop on Villa Place into a full meal.

The potato dish in the table gives you a savoury accompaniment that is easy to share. Start with one plate if you want only a snack, then add another if you are still hungry. Ordering several tapas makes the visit more meal-like and increases the bill even when each dish seems small.

The earlier weekend opening makes Barcelona an option for a daytime visit. Brunch offers a different occasion from the evening wine stop, while weekday happy hour suits an after-work arrival. Choose the patio if you want to sit outside, or an indoor seat if the weather makes that less appealing.

Weekend brunch

Saturday and Sunday, 11am–3pm

Happy hour

Monday–Friday, 4pm–6pm

Sources & fact-checking

Checks against the sources below cover: opening hours and key figures.

• Urban Cowboy — opening hours
• Bad Idea — key figures
• Barcelona Wine Bar — key figures
• Butterlamp Bread & Beverage — key figures
• The Authentique — opening hours
• The Authentique Wine Bar & Crêperie — key figures
• The Authentique — key figures