Food, Wine, Good (and Evil) Spirits

italiantable.jpg“So, Gary, what was your favorite wine of the night?”

It was about 11:15 and dinner had been over for about forty-five minutes, but no one had left the table. 

Our guests had been drinking water and nibbling on three types of chocolate in a desperate attempt to get back in driving condition before heading home.  It was at this point that I thought we should hear which of the nine wines we served were the favorites.

“I liked the Pigato and the Gattinara but the Sforzato kept getting better and better.  Maybe that one.”

The dinner was in part my personal graduation exercise after completing a fairly intensive Italian wine class given by the North American Sommelier Association, which is the only United States Sommelier Association affiliated with Associazione Italiana Sommelier, Italy’s premier sommelier society.  My wife, Peggy, had talked me into taking the course because of an ever growing interest in Italian wines that took hold after a trip to Tuscany about two years ago.

Read more ...

ImageMany of us have heard that old adage from the Corinthians: "When I was a child I spoke as a child, thought as a child, and reasoned as a child; but when I became a man I put away childish things." Well, when I was a child of sixteen I liked to drink beer, smoke pot and listen to Led Zeppelin at top volume.

Admit it – you did too.

Eventually, much to my dismay, I was required to become an adult and to reason as one. I am not saying that I have achieved any great levels of thought; but I did stop listening to Seventies arena rock. I thought I was supposed to. Just like I thought I was supposed to acquire some decent furniture, invest in an IRA, and make sure my hemline never again drifted above my thighs....that kind of crap.

I even brought myself to marry someone who liked “Smooth Jazz.” I found myself spending many evenings at the second-rate jazz clubs on Bleecker Street, trying to look at least mildly entertained as I listened to some tepid trio, while drinking even more tepid wine. There were things about adulthood I found incredibly disappointing.

I know I am not the only person who feels like this. New York City is full of adults who still crave the thrill and energy of the head-banger music of their childhoods, but no longer want to have to resort to banging their heads. In other words: We no longer want to fight for our right to party.

Read more ...

This warm and comforting drink is great on a cold day. 

mulledcider.jpg 1 cinnamon stick, broken into pieces (Use a meat mallet or heavy saucepan to break  into several pieces.)
1/2 teaspoon whole coriander seeds  
1/2 teaspoon allspice berries
1/4 teaspoon black peppercorns  
1/4 teaspoon whole cloves  
2 quarts apple cider  
4 strips orange zest (each about 2 inches long) 
1 – 3 tablespoons light brown sugar or dark brown sugar (to taste) 

Combine lime zest and juice, lemon zest and juice, sugar, and salt in large liquid measuring cup; cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until flavors meld, 24 hours.

Toast spices in large saucepan over medium heat, shaking pan occasionally, until fragrant, 1 to 3 minutes. Add cider, orange zest, and sugar and bring to boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 30 minutes, using wide, shallow spoon to skim away foam that rises to surface. Pour cider through fine-mesh strainer lined with coffee filter and discard spices and orange zest. Serve. (Mulled cider can be refrigerated in airtight container for up to one week. Reheat before serving.)

– Recipe courtesy of Cook Like James

sangria-thumbWith summer in full swing there’s no better drink to sip by the pool than sangria. Filled with fruit, it seems less “boozy” and perhaps slightly “healthy”, so if you start drinking it before Happy Hour there seems to be less shame and guilt involved. Believe me the fruit only masks the alcohol, but who cares? It’s a drink I find hard to resist.

While I always have wine in the house, I am not a big fruit lover. Sure, if someone else brings it all bright and juicy and already cut up, I’ll generally eat my fair share, but I’m more attracted to the “idea” of it than its physical reality. Plus, I’m more a cheesy/salty person. Sweets of any kind just don’t float my boat.

Read more ...

blindfold-drinking-w.-peggyThe email was very cryptic: “The Blindfold Dinner, April 24, 2012, at Osteria Mamma”. There wasn’t even a time, let alone an explanation. But still, how could we resist? After all, Osteria Mamma is our favorite Italian restaurant and the email is from Filippo, one of Mamma’s two sons who I became friends with first while taking an Italian Wine Specialist course and then from endless dinners at their restaurant. I hit the “reply” key on the email and write “Peggy and I will be there. What time?”

As the dinner approaches, we start to wonder exactly what will happen. The questions we keep coming back to are: (i) will it just feel silly to be blindfolded while sitting in the middle of a restaurant? (ii) will the blindfold really affect the flavor of food and our experience of it?, and most importantly, (iii) how do we avoid spilling our wine all over the people next to us? We find out that this is to be Osteria Mamma’s second Blindfold Dinner, so Peggy looks up the first on the internet and discovers that after a course is served and been experienced blindfolded, you can finish the dish with your sense of sight. (That’s when we decide to just not drink anything until we can see so our fellow dinners will all be safe.)

We get to the restaurant and are led to the back room that has a long table set for about fifteen guests. In addition to Filippo, our other host for the night is Giammario Villa, a wine educator who was one of the teachers at my wine class. Giammario is also an Italian wine importer and he is pairing the wine for the night. (At this point Peggy and I quickly reconsider and decide Giammario’s wines will be more than worth any possible risk to the clothes of those sitting next to us.)

Read more ...