It’s Been a Week of Food and Wine
Posted in Food and Wine Pairings, Restaurant, Uncategorized, Wine on May 17th, 2009 by Rene – 1 CommentYou know how some weeks you cook and some you don’t? Well this week was definitely one where I ate a lot but cooked very little of it. It all really started on Wednesday with lunch at California Pizza Kitchen in Schaumburg. Yes, the suburbs and a chain restaurant but the Buffalo Chicken Pizza was really good. I ordered it Neapolitan style so the crust was thinner than their usual. The slight heat and chopped chicken were really a nice surprise.
Thursday I went to Over Easy for breakfast. I ate fried bologna with sunny side up eggs. It was so good. The fried bologna brought back so many childhood memories even though this was not the stuff in the pre-packaged deli case named after a guy named Oscar. Thursday evening was a Rubicon Estates wine dinner at Charlie Trotters. This was the 2nd time my husband I have attended a Rubicon dinner there and it lived up to our expectations. There were 8 courses in all and each one was amazing. The wine was paired beautifully and was very generously poured. We ate eel with a banana foam, which although sounded weird, it was so good. The scallops with Thai curry had so many flavors going on I wanted to lick the plate (thought better of it considering where we were). Next was duck breast with a variety of flavors including licorice. The veal with morel mushrooms (I love those little ground gems) left another desire to lick the plate but this time I used bread to lop it all up! Abalone mushrooms were next and as expected, tasted great. The strip loin with porcinis left me wanting more. The last savory dish, Regal de Bourgogne cheese coated in mustard seed was my favorite of the evening. As much as I love mustard with cheese I never thought of preparing it this way. I could have eaten all 8 plates on the table although I bet the others I was dining with (all strangers until that night) would not have appreciated it. Dessert was an olive oil and chocolate chip parfait with dried cherries and oregano which was the perfect ending to a perfect meal. Overall the evening was great and has been on my mind since. I certainly wish I could dine like this more often!
Last night, Saturday, we had a casual dinner party and Sullivan Winevertical tasting at our home. 12 people in all enjoyed a meal paired with Sullivan’s rose, Pink Ink, 2006 and 2007, Sullivan Merlot 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000 and Sullivan Coeur de Vigne 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005. I won’t go into all the food details but all of the items people brought and we made were great and paired perfectly with the wine. Shrimp in a blanket, roasted veggies, mussels from Tizi Melloul that were the best mussels I have ever eaten, roasted fingerlings with rosemary, flank steak with 2 sauces, and pork tenderloin prepared 2 ways. The dessert were these amazing chocolate meringue cookies a neighbor of one of our guests made for him to bring to the party. The meal, company, and wine were all wonderful. The wine glasses and carafes are currently drying all over the kitchen and the fridge is full of wonderful leftovers (left what we ate for lunch!).
As of today I am cutting back on my food and wine consumption, at least for a few days, as I have to get ready for a 5 day weekend visiting friends in Kentucky!