The Rest of Us

[Sneakeater]

Another wine that gets more and more savory as it opens up (and I gave it a 90-minute decant, too).  Burgundy really IS The Shit.

[Sneakeater]

On 8/1/2009 at 7:48 PM, Sneakeater said:

[DELETE]

 

[DELETE][total fuckup]

[Sneakeater]

On 8/1/2009 at 7:44 PM, Sneakeater said:

If I'm not enjoying wine when I'm seventy, then my nieces and nephews are going to be stuck with a shitload of wine they won't know what to do with.

 

Or my next wife, who by then should be almost forty.

This post gets scarier every day.

[Sneakeater]

Grilled D'Artagnan Berkshire Porterhouse Pork Chop -- that prince of American pork chops -- with grilled hot and sweet peppers and balsamic vinegar.  The last(!) of those black beans (OK, except for one leftover portion of my faux Five-Way that I'll have to scarf down soonish) -- reunited this time with the yellow couscous I initially made with them.  Sautéed collard greens.

It occurs to me that, quite unintentionally, this dinner essentially repeated my initial meal with those long-lasting black beans -- except this time, instead of pretentiously trying to replicate a Cuban-Chinese pork chop with "elevated" ingredients, I made a can't-fail classic (with a much better pork chop).

Couldn't fail and didn't.

I figured a Monica di Sardegna would have enough flavor to stand up to everything while having a light enough texture not to play badly with the spicy peppers.

How about the best Monica now before the public?

2010 Dettori Chimbanta Badde Nicolosu

Detorri is one of those producers who were Natural avant la lettre:  they came upon the style out of personal conviction, without knowing it was a style.  People used to think their wines were strange.  Now they know.

This is a knockout.  Big Fucking Hit of cherries/raspberries/I guess cranberries.  Then a sour follow-up that was just perfect with the hot peppers.

I'm my favorite Somm.

[Sneakeater]

I'm tasting cinnamon.  Who'da thunk?

[Anthony Bonner]

8 hours ago, Sneakeater said:

 

2010 Dettori Chimbanta Badde Nicolosu

Detorri is one of those producers who were Natural avant la lettre:  they came upon the style out of personal conviction, without knowing it was a style.  People used to think their wines were strange.  Now they know.

This is a knockout.  Big Fucking Hit of cherries/raspberries/I guess cranberries.  Then a sour follow-up that was just perfect with the hot peppers.

I'm my favorite Somm.

I like the Dettori wines and its true they were natural before natural was cool, but that wasn't the issue with them. Even the naturalistas used to complain about the more than occasional VA or brett bomb especially given the prices.

[Sneakeater]

It's true that's always been the rap against Dettori (the way nekulturies like me would put it is "too much bottle variation").  You could, and can still, say the same about Musar.  Interestingly, you can no longer say it about Cornelissen.

[Sneakeater]

Voyager really gave me a hankering for a homemade Fillet O Fish.  Fried flounder/melted cheddar/spigarello/"tartar" sauce (Duke's mayonnaise with chopped pickles and capers)/Martin's buns.  Raw radishes 'n their greens on the side.  I didn't even try to get the fish pieces square.

If ever a meal cried out for an entry-level Borgogne blanc, it was this.

2014  André Bonnhomme Mâcon Villages "Vielles Vignes"

No bottle variation here.  This wine is always its quaffable, better-than-it-needs-to-be-if-nowhere-near-great self.

It's probably owing to the season that I'm tasting a lot of apples tonight.  But mainly this tastes like Chardonnay.

I see from the label that this winery was started the same year I was.  (It's my birthday week!)  If these vines were planted at that time, those are some vielles vignes indeed.

[Sneakeater]

Tonight's meal was an example of the benefits of cooking for yourself alone.  This is JUST what I like.  I don't have to worry what other people might find gross.

Veal chop Milanese with melted mozzarella and sautéed mushrooms and capers.  Sautéed spigarello on the side.

(Hmmmmm.  Making a lot of fried stuff this week.  Cuz it's my birthday week?  Cuz I'm so old it no longer seems like it could make a difference?)

This was a meal where there was a very clear choice what to drink.  No deep thought, no agonizing.  I like that.

2002 Ar.Pe.Pe. Sasella Riserva "Rocce Rosse"

A Valtellina, duh.  Nebbiolo -- or whatever they call it over there -- loves veal.  And Ar.Pe.Pe. of course makes the best wine in Lombardy.

This is a very nice wine.  2002 wasn't the greatest vintage in that part of the world.  But good winemaking will out.  And drinking an aged wine in its prime helps.

The copious fruit at the start is surprisingly dark for a wine this old (although compared to me . . .):  blackberry/blackcurrant dark.  There's tar, but no roses (this is Valtellina, not the Piemonte).  Pronounced eucalyptus at the finish (which is quite long).

[Sneakeater]

OK, SOME roses.

[Sneakeater]

I have one Milanese veal chop left and fuck do I know JUST what I'm gonna do to it (and drink with it).

[Sneakeater]

The mushrooms were Chanterelles and Hedgehogs (with a good dose of garlic), BTW.  YUM-fucking-O.

[voyager]

11 hours ago, Sneakeater said:

Tonight's meal was an example of the benefits of cooking for yourself alone. .... I don't have to worry what other people might find gross.

 

(Hmmmmm.  Making a lot of fried stuff this week.  Cuz it's my birthday week?  Cuz I'm so old it no longer seems like it could make a difference?)

i

As I've written before, the hardest part of cooking for me is to cook/season to someone else's taste.    You listen to the other's comments and critiques, taste as you cook and try to skew a dish to another's palate.   And you miss by a mile and plate a compromise that hits no one's mark.

And, yes, (the?) one joy of the golden years is falling outside the statistical loop of lifestyle guidelines.    As in, "whatever you're doing has got you this far."   

[Josh Karpf]

We prepare separate breakfasts and lunches. For brunch she has a little of my eggs/meats and I have a little of her fruity pancakes or waffles. I love her savory/spicy dinners across the board, and sometimes I'll sear a meat or bake a fish or conjure a bowl of ramen she'll like very much.

She loves lots of salt,* but I've so cut back on that that a little can be too much. I like sour with bitterness or acidity but not with sweetness. She loves spiking sweetness with sourness. As we've worked through the 44 pounds of bananas I'd accidentally bought, we did banana shakes with cocoa, and when she suggested adding yogurt to the milk, I couldn't help cringing.

Since restaurant dishes are always to share, I'd rarely eat Chinese or Korean if I didn't make it myself. At least we both love Indian. And wine (cocktails are mostly mine).

Our separate recipes for using up the last of the nanners:

Hers: banana bread, lowfat banana pudding
Mine: banana fritters, bananas in coconut milk, bananas Foster

* And hot sauce.

[Sneakeater]

Leftover reheated Cincinnati Five-Way Chili, with sautéed cabbage and onions on the side.

N/V Stone Hill Hermmansberger

A proprietary blend -- but Stone Hill doesn't grow any noble European grapes over there in Hermann, MO, so we can guess this is all hybrids and maybe, just maybe, a purely local grape or two.

This is what it is.  A little pissy -- that's a bad thing -- and a little sour -- that needn't be a bad thing, but is here.   The tart fruit, though, is nice enough.  No length.  No finish.

You can sort of tell this is a wine made for people who don't really like wine.

Somehow not inappropriate to this dinner.