Sunday was another wonderful wine pairing dinner that left 8 people very happy, a little full and perfectly faded. Those three ingredients always make for a memorable evening.
I like requests
If you don’t know me or know how I roll; I use the San Diego farmers markets to guide my menus. Most of my parties, (especially pairing dinners,) are driven by what is seasonally awesome. I’ll get an idea of what you want–and don’t want, then I head off to the market and pick what is interesting and/or beautiful. The host usually has a request regarding proteins; for this party, no red meat. I actually love dietary requests because I enjoy narrowing my scope of thought. Sometimes I get a little twitchy if I have too many options. If you’re curious what I did, here is a synopsis. Sorry I don’t have more pics, but the ones I took, don’t do the food justice. Maybe I need to hire a photographer.
The Business
The Cherry peppers were stuffed with a luscious onion bread pudding and roasted. Drizzled with praline olive oil.
The baby green tomatoes were kept whole, breaded with corn flour and ground panko, fried in peanut oil and served with sweet jalapeno remoulade. (cute as shit they were)
The corn was used for corn soup with crispy onions, oregano flowers and avocado that was pressed in sea salt and smoked paprika (Chardonnay)
Baby turnips were braised in achiote butter with wilted spinach around pickled and seared Armenian cucumber, seared scallop and peeled white plum. (Pinot Noir)
The tomatoes were simply roasted and plated with ricotta gnocchi, sauteed shitakes and fresh thyme; topped with cinnamon and sugar broiled grouper and soy truffle broth. (Cabernet Sauvignon)
Strawberries were macerated with habanero over a fresh orange, vanilla biscuit filled with passion fruit crème fraiche. (Riesling)
