An Oenophile in Cocktail City

What is one to do when a hot day calls for a crisp Sancerre, or a dish requires an Amarone and all the menu offers is a bevy of complicated craft cocktails? One answer is to head to East Nashville’s Bad Idea — the wine-forward sanctuary owned by Alex Burch, The Court of Master Sommeliers advanced sommelier and the Michelin Guide's 2025 American South Sommelier Award winner.

The setting — a former church — has been converted into a light and airy space with an expansive bar and an even more expansive wine list. The room lends itself equally well to happy hour, date night or becoming the kind of regular who no longer needs to ask what to order.

Alex has curated a list that reads like a gathering of old and new friends, pairing familiar Old World regions with grapes and producers that offer something less expected. There is none of the laboratory playground where mixologists reign supreme. Here, the experimentation happens in the glass.

With more than 200 artisan selections from around the world, the list is built for exploration. Wines can be enjoyed alongside Bad Idea’s excellent menu, certainly, but they can also become the focal point of the evening. Flights offer an opportunity to compare, discover and, perhaps most importantly, find something you didn’t know you liked — that may be Bad Idea’s best idea.

For all the ceremony that can surround wine, Alex seems intent on removing intimidation without sacrificing expertise. A serious wine list does not require a serious wine drinker. One can arrive knowing the difference between Barolo and Brunello — or simply knowing that it’s 95 degrees outside and something cold, crisp and white sounds awfully good.

That sense of discovery carries through the list. A blanc de blancs may rub elbows with a Croatian orange wine. Familiar names like chardonnay and sangiovese provide an entry point, while more adventurous selections like graševina and cinsault invite the curious farther afield. Rather than asking diners to decipher the list on their own, the staff becomes part guide, part matchmaker.

The food follows the same philosophy. Instead of relegating wine to the role of supporting actor, dishes like whipped pimento cheese, bay scallop crudo and chicken ballotine create opportunities to move through the list — a glass here, a bottle there, perhaps something entirely unexpected in between.

There is an irony, of course, in finding this particular refuge inside a former church. In a city increasingly devoted to the gospel of craft cocktails, Bad Idea has created a different sort of congregation: people who still believe an evening can begin — and end — with a very good bottle of wine.

Amen to that.