Thank you to Chef David Burke, Stu Levine, owner at Vino 100…..and Happy Birthday to me!
What can I say? Sometimes, I am just a lucky girl. Recently, I was given the opportunity to observe, taste and pour wine at two cooking demonstrations given by Chef David Burke. And to top it off…it was my birthday! It was really a wonderful way to start my special day. During the first demo, I was given a beautiful taste test of each dish Chef Burke created. His first dish was scrambled eggs with lobster served in an egg shell. In his restaurants, he serves this dish in giant ostrich egg shells but for the purposes of this demo, and to show us what an appetizer portion looks like, he served the dish in regular egg shells. After showing us clever ways to remove the tops of eggshells, he spooned in a mixture of lobster meat and eggs which had been scrambled with chives and tomatoes. The finished dish was topped with crème fraiche and a dab of caviar. The presentation was beautiful and the dish itself absolutely delicious. There’s nothing like lobster, and it paired perfectly with the eggs, caviar and crème fraiche. Dish number two featured his housemade Gravlax. He cures the salmon with molasses and spices. Thin slices were wrapped around pretzel sticks to make for ease of eating. The crunchy sticks with the soft melt-in-your-mouth salmon was really heavenly. Alongside was a little frisee salad which had been drizzled with mustard oil, mustard seeds and most interesting of all….fried capers! Then came the main course, and oh, what a course it was: Braised short ribs on a bed of polenta. The polenta was different than any I had eaten before in that he adds fresh corn kernels along with lots of pepper jack cheese. The fresh corn gave the polenta great texture, but the cheese gave it a nicely seasoned, slightly spicy flavor. This polenta definitely had an American flavor rather than the Italian flavor I’m used to. He seasoned his boneless short ribs with coffee and unsweetened cocoa powder before pan searing them and then braising them in an Asian inspired marinade for several hours. When served, they were moist and so tender. They made me swoon…..really. And last, but not least, dessert. We were treated to a grilled pepper pineapple tort. It was very unique, interesting and bursting with flavor. He seasons pineapple slices with freshly ground black pepper before grilling them. Then he creates a tower of fresh strawberries sandwiched between two grilled pineapple rings. He fills the center with either ice cream or whipped cream. But here’s the best part: Chef Burke made an incredible syrup from fresh red bell peppers! What?! I know….I was amazed too. In a saucepan, he combined diced red bell peppers with lots of sugar and apple juice. This reduces down into a delicious and beautiful syrup which he drizzled over the entire dessert. Perfection. After consuming all these wonderful dishes, and receiving a cookbook signed by Chef Burke, I moved on to a second demonstration. At this event, Chef Burke was preparing similar dishes for a different, bigger audience. The wine shop I work at was responsible for providing and pouring wines to pair with each dish. For this audience, he made a gazpacho soup which Stu Levine, our owner paired with a choice of rosè or dry sherry. Chef Burke then served his braised short ribs with polenta again (which I ate again…don’t tell), and we poured one of my favorite wines in the shop; the Arcangelo primitivo. Lastly, we served a sweet dessert wine with the pineapple/strawberry dessert. All the featured wines are available from Vino 100 http://www.vino100whiteplains.com The audience really enjoyed themselves (as did I!), and lapped up all the food and wine. Thank you to Chef David Burke, Stu Levine, owner at Vino 100…..and Happy Birthday to me! Chef David Burke puts the finishing touches on his Grilled Peppered Pineapple Torte.
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I know….it doesn’t sound very appetizing, but thankfully I’m not talking about wine made from chickens. (That would just be gross.) I am talking about chickens on the label and chicken jugs. Okay, maybe I’m not making sense yet. Let me start over. I drink a lot of wine. Am I making sense now? And coincidentally, two recent wines I really liked both featured chickens on the label. One was from Italy, and the other from the state of Washington; two of my favorite places for fantastic wine. And all that chicken labeling made me think about chicken jugs; one of my favorite ceramic pieces from Italy. Let’s start with the wine. The first one was a primitivo from Puglia, Italy. It comes from Primaterra Wines. I consider this a real bargain find; one of those wines I call a “case buy”. No, I haven’t bought a case though I probably should have, as we’ve gone through several bottles already, and I must admit to having a couple more waiting in my wine rack. It was about $10 and for that price, it really delivers. It’s nicely balanced making it an easy sipper. It goes well with food, but doesn’t Need food for it to taste good. I taste the bold and dark berry flavors I love; but it’s not too fruity. It has an alcohol content of 14.5%, so watch out, but really, it’s just delicious and at this price point, it could be my “house” wine. The second wine with a chicken (well, on second glance, it’s actually a rooster) on the label was a syrah from Jones of Washington http://www.jonesofwashington.com. It was one of the wines I poured at The Bite event in Portland last month and was featured by The Pacific Northwest Wine Club http://www.pnwc.com. It’s a nice bold wine with lots of dark berry, oaky, and leathery flavors. It too has a 14.5% alcohol level. (I seem to lean toward these for some reason.) Its winery won the 2012 Winery of the Year award for Washington State. I love this wine for its complex flavor and lingering taste. Now as I said, these “chicken wines” made me think about my Italian chicken jug. Italy, widely known for its ceramics is home to the chicken wine jug. Supposedly the chicken wine jug came about way back in the mid 1400’s when the Medici family was the ruling family of Florence. One of the members of an opposing family wanted to murder one of the members of the Medici family. When the assassins made their approach in the dark of night through a small village where the Medici family member had been attending a festival, the local chickens were awakened. They caused such a ruckus that the assassins were captured and received the fate originally intended for the Medici family member. The end result is that the ruling family member was so pleased with the chickens that he ordered ceramic chicken jugs made to commemorate the event. Since then, chicken jugs have been traditional gifts of good fortune and safekeeping……or so the story goes. Do you enjoy Italian wines? Do you love Italian ceramics? Me too! Join me on a tour of Italy featuring food, wine…….and even chicken jugs if you’d like. Booking now for Spring/Fall 2014. Drop me a line and let’s talk about your trip: irene@bellagiornatatours.com
Meet Fabrizio Antano
Bevagna is a charming little town. Unlike many of the hill towns I love in Umbria, it is not quite as high. As a result, one has to look a little harder for the panoramic views of the expansive countryside that I see from other Umbrian hill towns. But, it does have something else making it worth a visit….great wine, great food and great people. There is one person in particular who I would love to introduce you to. Please meet Fabrizio Antano. Fabrizio and his family produce wonderful wines from their near 30 acres of grapes. Production began in 1975 by his father, and continues today under the guidance of Fabrizio’s brother Francesco. Fabrizio’s charge is the charming little shop in Bevagna where one can go to taste all these wine gems. After I’d lived in Rome for about a year and half, I discovered Fabrizio’s little wine shop on one of our numerous forays into Umbria. Oh, woe is me! I so wish I had found him sooner. You enter Bevagna from one of two ways; either through a lovely old stone arch, which leads into the town’s main piazza which is ringed with great restaurants, or via a bridge over a charming little river. The shop is very easy to reach from either direction. While living in Rome, I was able to purchase 5 liter jugs of red table wine which became our personal “house wine”. It was so reliably delicious and inexpensive. We would lug those jugs home on the subway, and it was so worth the effort. If airlines would get over that silly little 100ml of fluids rule, I’d be packing some serious wine in the overhead bins. Now I have to get my fix of Fattoria Di Milziade Antano wine in one of two ways: I pack too many bottles of it into my check-in luggage when I am on an Italy trip, or I have to order through his New York importer (www.tedwardwines.com). Yes, all those things Fabrizio is carrying.....are my purchases. But now that I have to pay premium money for it, it is no longer the everyday table wine I’m after. The Antano family produces a Montefalco Rosso Riserva that is beyond delicious. It is so flavorful from start to finish; complex, and smooth. It has a silky mouth feel that makes me sigh when I take my first sip. But there’s more….they also make a phenomenal Sagrantino di Montefalco. Sagrantino is that wine that gave me such a rush when I first moved to Italy. It will always hold a special place in my heart alongside Amarone from the Veneto area. But I have to say, it’s not just the wine from Fattoria di Milziade Antano that I love. It’s the whole wine shopping experience that Fabrizio provides. Fabrizio gives very generous pours (so different than the wine “tastes” I’ve had in the U.S.), and when one is sipping such generous pours, a little food is necessary. He always has wonderful olives, yummy little cookies, bread drizzled with the family olive oil….. He’s eager to share his knowledge of wine in general, and the wonderful attributes of the family’s wine. He is very generous not only his wine and food, but also with his time. You are never made to feel rushed or compelled to buy. But I dare you to walk in there and not come out with your hands full...................I can’t. A friend of mine recently told me about a great dinner he had cooked for him and his wife that was so delicious, yet simple. Though he is not Italian, his basic list of ingredients had so many familiar Italian components to it; I decided to give it a try. He basically used onions, peppers, sausage, chickpeas and tomatoes. I changed the recipe up a bit based on what I had in my refrigerator at the time. Here’s your list of ingredients: Olive oil 1 red bell pepper, chopped 1 small onion, chopped 2 celery ribs, chopped 1 garlic clove, minced 2 sweet Italian sausages 1 can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed A glug of white wine 1 28-32 oz can of whole Italian plum tomatoes in puree Salt, pepper, Italian seasoning Bread slices and a garlic clove (optional) Let's get started! Set a large skillet on the stove and add a swirl of olive oil to it. Set your burner to med/hi. Add the chopped peppers, onions, celery and minced garlic. Sauté to wilt the vegetables. With your knife, make a slit through the casing of the sausages, enabling you to quickly remove and discard the casing. Crumble the sausage meat into the skillet with the vegetables and continue to sauté to brown the sausage. Season with a little salt, pepper and Italian seasoning. Add the drained chickpeas to the skillet when the sausage has browned. (I always rinse and drain my canned beans. This washes away the salty liquid, enabling me to season the dish to my liking.) Add a glug of white wine, and let the mixture cook to evaporate the wine. Add in the tomatoes, giving each one a good squeeze to release its juices. (I love this part! Yes, sometimes, I squirt the stove, or me…but that’s why they make cute aprons.) Taste to see if it needs more salt and pepper. Simmer the whole shebang for about 10 minutes, and you’re done! At the last minute, I decided to serve my “stew” over bruschetta. I quickly toasted some bread, rubbed it with a raw garlic clove, and placed it in the bottom of my soup bowl. I drizzled some good olive oil over the bread before ladling my stew over the top. It was a wonderful, hearty and delicious one-pot meal. My delicious dinner came out the consistency of stew. When my friend, Zvi makes it, it’s more like soup. You could certainly add more tomatoes and some water. You could also change this up with whatever you have in the frig. I think it would be great with chopped spinach, diced carrots, leeks, or even cubes of zucchini. Thanks for the idea Zvi!
Oh, and don’t forget to wash it down with something delicious. In this case, a lovely bottle of Aglianico from Villa Matilde Rocca dei Leoni in Campania, available from www.vino100whiteplains.com Sigh. I consider Oregon my home. I went to college there, met my husband there, and my children were born there. I love it to death. But the wine...not so much. Before people take too much offense, let me explain myself. I like white wine, and I’ve found some lovely whites from Oregon, but I Love red wine. I learned to love red wine while living in Italy; home to big, bold, meaty, juicy, tasty bottles of goodness. (Excuse me while I take a moment to close my eyes and let out a deep sigh.) Oregon is very pinot noir centric, and it is simply not my style of wine. The pinot noir grape is a sensitive thing. It prefers cool weather which is perfect for Oregon, but it is a very finicky grape. Its thin skin is susceptible to disease. It doesn’t like it when it’s too windy. It must be pruned just so. Maybe this is why it is such an expensive wine as well. I really want to love Oregon wine. If somebody would just point me in the direction of a deeper, bolder pinot noir, I would be more than happy to give it a taste. In the meantime, I keep finding wines from Washington State that I’m quite happy with. Recently, I took a short road trip to Prosser and Walla Walla. I tasted approximately 50 wines over the course of two days. Yes, that’s a lot of wine, but I have become the queen of spitting in an effort to taste all I can and remain standing. (Advice to spitters: Don’t wear white and bring a clip to hold your hair back.) When you taste 50, or even 25 wines, at some point you have to take a step back and ask yourself, “Which ones do I remember? Which ones stand out from the crowd? Which ones would I spend my dollars on?” Of all the wineries and tasting rooms I visited, three stood out to me. The first is Gamache Vintners whose tasting room is located at the Prosser Vintner’s Village. The Gamache family began planting grapes back in 1982 when there were just a few wineries in the whole state. Fast forward thirty years, and now there are more than 700 wineries in the state with more than 100 in Walla Walla alone. But the Gamache family got in on the ground floor. They produce small lots of wine, tending the grapes by hand. The care they take with the grapes and the knowledge of the winemakers show through in these beautifully crafted wines. www.gamachevintners.com My second pick was from a tasting room located in downtown Walla Walla called Forgeron Cellars. Winemaker Marie-Eve Gilla sources grapes from vineyards in both Oregon and Washington to make her delicious wines. Here are wines that are really my style; deep and hearty. Barbera and Zinfadel were particularly delicious. www.forgeroncellars.com My third choice was a winery outside Walla Walla called Castillo de Feliciana. Here in a Spanish style building, I tasted wines made by this family of Spanish heritage. Their tempranillo is delicious and the bottle of Cohones red table wine would make a wonderful everyday house wine. The wines here are not only tasty, but a great value and whoever does their artwork should be commended. www.castillodefeliciana.com If you haven’t made your way to Walla Walla yet, I would highly recommend you do so. There are simply too many wineries to visit in a weekend, a week or even a month. (Well, maybe I could do it in a month….hmmm, a challenge.) Most people only manage a couple of wineries a day when they are consuming full samples. I managed to hit 10-12, tasting about 5 wines at each, in two days…..by spitting. Tasting by this method brings great joy and a little disappointment. After all, who wouldn’t love to taste so many wines, but at the end of the day you realize, you never got to sit down and simply enjoy a full glass of something. This is where wonderful downtown Walla Walla comes in. It is full of so many lovely places to eat. So at the end of a busy day of tasting, it is possible to have a relaxing evening eating a delicious meal and sipping a fabulous wine by the glass…the whole glass. What a great way to end the day! Are you interested in a tour of Walla Walla wineries? I would love to escort you and your group on a trip to discover all the area has to offer. Please contact me at irene@bellagiornatatours.com I will make all the arrangements including limo transportation, restaurant/hotel reservations, and wine tasting of course! Let me take you away.
Tour the Wineries of Walla Walla, WA. w/ the Pacific Northwest Wine Club! April 12-14, 20131/15/2013 Won't you join me for a glass of wine? The Pacific Northwest Wine Club has teamed up with Bella Giornata Tours to explore some of the club's favorite wineries in the fabulous area of Walla Walla, Washington. Participants will drive themselves to Walla Walla on a Friday afternoon, park their cars in the hotel lot, and not have to touch them again until Sunday. Let us take care of you for the weekend. Friday evening, we'll stroll to a nearby restaurant together where we'll be served a fabulous gourmet meal with wine. Saturday morning, a lovely bus will come pick us all up from the hotel. We'll spend the day together touring wineries, sampling tastings and having a wonderful lunch at one of the wineries. Saturday evening is some down time for you to have a private dinner to yourself. The tour concludes after breakfast at the hotel on Sunday. We'll have a suggested list of wineries in case you'd like to stop at a few more places on your way home. The tour includes two nights at the Best Western Walla Walla, Friday night's gourmet dinner, seven hours of bus transportation on Saturday, wine tastings, wine tours, lunch on Saturday and more! Contact Kevin at the Pacific Northwest Wine Club at mailto:kcraig@pnwc.com or you can contact me at Bella Giornata Tours at mailto:irene@bellagiornatatours.com A reservation deposit of $50 is what is necessary to save your seat on the bus. Click on the tab for the "April Wine Tour" for complete information. I know it’s not spring, and I really shouldn’t be cooking out of season, but I saw a lovely package of freshly shelled peas at the market, and I couldn’t stop myself. I knew I already had some mushrooms at home, and I always have pancetta in the fridge….so, this is what I came up with for dinner. It came together so quickly! Honestly, by the time the pasta was done cooking, the rest of the dish was ready and waiting in the skillet. Here’s your list of ingredients: a little olive oil Pancetta, diced Onions, diced A smashed garlic clove Mushrooms, sliced Freshly shucked peas A slosh of white wine Pasta of your choice ( I used “dischi”), cooked al dente Parmesan, grated to garnish Let’s get started! Put your pasta water on to boil. Meanwhile, dice your onions, and slice your mushrooms. I buy my pancetta already diced, so nothing to do there. Smash your garlic clove, remove and discard the papery skin. Heat just a wee bit of olive oil in a skillet. You won’t need much as the pancetta will release a little fat as well. Add the smashed garlic clove and pancetta, and sauté to add garlic flavor to the oil, and render the fat from the pancetta. Now add the diced onions and sliced mushrooms. Saute to wilt the onions and to get the mushrooms to release their liquid. Toss out the garlic clove. *Is your pasta water boiling yet? If so, toss in a goodly amount of coarse salt, let it melt away and add your pasta of choice. I would choose a short pasta for this dish like orchiette, dischi, penne or rigatoni. Back to your skillet: As it’s about to run dry, add a nice slosh of white wine, and let the alcohol cook away. Time to roll in your peas. Give them a good swish about in the pan to cover them with the skillet juices and wine. Add a cooking spoonful of starchy water from the pasta pot. This starchy water will not only help steam the peas, but will also serve to loosen the yummy bits that have stuck themselves to the bottom of the skillet. By this time, your pasta should be close to done. Taste a pea to be sure they’re cooked to your liking, and then add the drained pasta to the skillet. Again, give it a good tossing to be sure the pasta gets coated with all the goodness that's in the skillet. Slide it all into a pasta bowl, and top with grated cheese. Delizioso! (And so quick!) This pasta dish would have been nice with a cool glass of pinot grigio. But, since all I had on hand was red, I chose a primitivo that I'm loving called LeSciare. At a mere $10 a bottle, it has a lot of flavor, but it's not too heavy. And can you believe my "caprese"? I was so hungry, I couldn't be bothered to make a real salad! That's a lovely ball of buffalo milk mozarella, a few tomatoes, a nice drizzle of Ersilia's olive oil and a sprinkle of sea salt. Dinner was SO good!
GREAT NEWS! I've just published a new tour agenda for May. It's called "Girlfriends on the Go", and promises to be loads of fun. Grab five of your best friends, and Let's GO! You get a $100 discount for being the lead girlfriend and rounding up your best buds. I take over from there, doing all the work and planning for you, ensuring that you all have a Fabulous trip! For full details click on the tab for Spring 2013. Dear Diary, We start October 8th by boarding our lovely vehicle and making our way to Deruta; land of ceramics. What fun to stroll from shop to shop perusing all they have to offer. Then, as luck would have it, we are offered a spur of the moment backstage tour of the Gialletti Giulio shop and studio! We watch as the potter makes a vase lickety split, followed by a bowl with scalloped edges….all in about 2 minutes. We’re shown the giant kiln and are then amazed by the ginormous vat of underglaze each item is dipped into. The best part is getting to watch the artists at work. They are amazing…painting all the very delicate and intricate designs with a steady hand. Maybe they don’t drink as much espresso as I do. After hauling our purchases to the van, we make our way back to Todi for lunch and to get ready for cooking class. We have a delicious lunch in a restaurant with a stupendous panoramic view of the valley. It’s such a fabulous day to eat outside and soak in the natural beauty of the area. Everyone opts for something different; pizzas, various salads. We’re trying to eat light in anticipation of cooking class tonight. Our cooking class is held in a beautiful winery called Decugnano dei Barbi between Todi and Orvieto. It’s perfectly perched on a ridge with a view of Orvieto in the distance and row after row of grapevines falling away from every side. We take a tour of the winery and even get to see how sparkling wine is made and stored in the old Etruscan tombs. After the tour, we’re off to the restored chapel for cooking lessons. We’re joined by another small group to make: Focaccia bread, tagliatelle pasta with tomato and mushroom sauce, stuffed zucchini and brutti ma buoni cookies. What a great name for these cookies! It means, “ugly, but good”. Along with each course, we get to taste the wines made here. We had a long night last night. We spent five hours at the winery and made our way back to the hotel rather late. So Oct. 9th is a sleep-in morning. Yay! No alarm clocks. But by 11:00, we are off to Montefalco. For the first time, the weather is not cooperating. Since its raining so much, it’s hard to sightsee. What should we do? I know…let’s eat! We have a fantastic lunch; pasta cooked in Sagrantino wine, lentil soup…everyone chooses something different. But there’s one thing on the menu that we ALL seemed to want: roasted artichokes. Oh my! They melted in your mouth leaving the crispy brown edges to crunch on. Oh. So. Good. After lunch, we’re in for a real treat. We have a wine tasting at a winery that is so passionate about natural wine making. We tour the facility and are amazed to see the freshly picked Sagrantino grapes drying on their racks. Soon they will begin the process to become Sagrantino Passito, the famous sweet wine of the area. I have tasted many passiti from Umbria (I am either proud or ashamed to say), and the passito from Paolo Bea is simply the best. We’ve been busy the past two days and the trip is winding down….only two more days left on the tour, but there is still so much to see and do!
More coming soon, Irene Dear Diary, What a find today! Who knew you could have lunch in a horse stall? Today, on our way to Assisi, we have made reservations at an adorable little restaurant that used to be old animal stables back in the day. Thank goodness we arrived early, because the restaurant filled up quickly with hungry folks looking for great food cooked over an open flame. Most of us had grilled meats; sausages, pigeons, pork and also grilled vegetables. The onions had been grilled until they melted in your mouth, and the potatoes having been cooked in the ashes were soft and fluffy on the inside and crispy and charred on the outside. La Stalla was rustic, loud, and delicious. Now that our hunger has been sated, we move on to Assisi to stroll this beautiful hill top village. While there, we see sweet shops galore. Federico, the driver spies a chocolate concoction he has to try and Bruce goes for yet another gelato as does Luca, the son of our translator Holly who has joined us for the day along with Holly’s husband, Giovanni. (Maybe our hunger wasn’t completely sated afterall?) We work off our lunch and treats by wandering the beautiful streets and admiring the Basilica of St. Francis. The hills of Assisi have done their magic and made us hungry enough to tackle a nice dinner. We’ve moved on to Todi for the next two nights and are dining tonight at Pane e Vino, one of my favorite little spots. Fabio and Loredana have prepared a wonderful meal for us. We start with an assortment of crostini and a beautiful bottle of Sagrantino. We move on to a risotto with saffron and pumpkin and continue with a stew made with Sagrantino wine. Whew! Barely able to move, but still we can’t resist the dessert: A lovely piece of cake smothered in pastry custard and garnished with blackberry sauce. Time for a digestivo! What’s that, you ask? Well, we weren’t sure to be honest, so we asked Fabio to show us just what he had brewing in that giant vat of alcohol. Turns out, it was a massive wad of thyme. Highly unattractive, but when he filters it and refrigerates it, it becomes a “digestive”; a drink consumed in small quantity which is to help you digest your food. “When in Rome!” (Well, actually, we’re in Todi, but still…) And what's with the Christmas decorations, you might ask? Well, we were equally bewildered. Turns out, the previous weekend a film was being shot in town and they needed the town to look like it was Christmas time. All the shopkeepers decorated their windows as if it were Christmas. Christmas trees were hauled in, and lights were strung everywhere. Then, kind of jokingly, the restaurants thought to go ahead and serve Christmas menus. So after our delicious dessert, we got Christmas cookies (in October)! Merry Christmas from Todi!
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Italophile......
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