Last Wednesday, we had our 2nd annual Festa Piedmontese event at the Palace Ballroom where we hosted some famous Italian wine makers and Italian chef Marco of La Libera from the Piedmontese region. We tasted some fabulous Barolos and Barbarescos that were paired with perfect little bites of savory Piedmontese cuisine. One of the “bites” shown here came fresh off the coals out front of the ballroom, then was carried into the room by four strapping chefs, and was served up by Eric Tanaka, our executive chef.
By the way, if you are interested in German wines, we have a famous German chef, Mirko Reeh, coming in on July 14th, and we’ll be tasting wines and cusines from that region. Check it out here.
June 30th, 2009 | No Comments »
Bonjourno! This was the wine drinkers’ cry this past Wednesday as we greeted some wonderful winemakers from the Piedmont region of Italy at the Festa Piedmontese! With close to 200 wine and food enthusiasts, the fete was a summertime success. Piedmont is a striking Northern region of Italy that is surrounded by the Alps. This leads to rolling hills, long summer days, and refreshing nights. Can’t you just picture yourself there? Noshing on some salty, cured meats, pungent cheese, and sipping dry mineral-tastic wines….
There were wonderful nibbles and many fine wine producers everywhere in the two rooms at the Palace Ballroom. But a few winemakers definitely tugged at my heart strings. The Barolo Brothers of 2004 from Fratelli Alessandria balanced a tannin structure and golden raisin palate that made my mouth water for some prosicutto crudo.
The Roero Arneis from Filippo Gallino is made from a quirky, small white wine grape that is so unusual, so little known or grown, that it made me cry! The crisp, limestone and fresh grass nose with a hint of pineapple on the palate helped me sing the praises of the rabbit terrine. Read the rest of this entry »
June 30th, 2009 | No Comments »
Here is a photo of the oldest olive tree in the world that I took while on my vacation in Crete. They say the tree is between 3,000 and 5,000 years old and still producing olives. Can you believe the size of the trunk? They used a branch from the tree for the opening ceremony of the Olympics! I think I read that Greece supplies 32% of the world’s olive oil.
June 30th, 2009 | 2 Comments »
The Best of the City 2009 article in the July issue of Seattle Metropolitan Magazine (scroll down until you find it on the link) includes Lola’s Moroccan Tagine, described as “extraordinary,” especially “the one with moist strands of goat meat simmering in a sticky braise of dates and caramelized shallots.” Congrats to Chef Brock Johnson and the whole Lola team!
June 29th, 2009 | No Comments »
The other day, Jeff and I decided to have a carnivorous date, so we headed over to our local restaurant, Quinn’s, on Capitol Hill. I had a couple amazing slabs of spicy and smoky pork ribs. I was so sad when I was finished! The potato salad had some delightful, crispy bacon and- as Eric Tanaka says- “everything is better with bacon!” The crispness of my ale was a perfect pairing!
June 29th, 2009 | No Comments »
Amy Pennington, of Go Go Green Garden, and also a Tom Douglas Restaurants alumna, is featured in “Reader’s Big Ideas” in the July issue of Sunset Magazine, including a big gorgeous photo of Amy working in one of her gardens with a rake. Sunset loves the Big Idea that Amy created with her buddies, Jesse Dawson and Gannon Curran, to come up with Urban Garden Share.
The idea, as Sunset puts it, is a “site that would connect homeowners who have green space with gardeners who have none (basically an online dating model, but with vegetables.)”
Congratulations, Amy!
June 29th, 2009 | No Comments »
Here’s a photo of what must be considered the Holy Trinity of Tuscan cuisine- olive oil, red wine, and Tuscan bread- all set out on the charming white marble kitchen table of our rented villa:
Olive oil: So much of what we ate in Florentine restaurants was finished with a float of beautiful olive oil, whether soup, bread, fish, or meat. We used this delicious olive oil (pictured in the photo)- made right on the property of our “agritourismo” (a combination of farm and tourist lodging), in all of our own cooking at the villa- whether we were dressing a salad, or drizzling oil over a platter of tomatoes, green beans, or grilled steak. In a cellar across the road from our villa, I watched as the ever helpful agritourismo worker, Fillipo, ladled the oil for us out of a huge terracotta urn through a funnel and into these little green tins. The tins on the table in this photo are waiting to be shipped home to the U.S. Shipping turned out to be crazy expensive, but I’m so excited about my tins of Tuscan olive oil- priceless!
Red Wine: The bottle of Vino Nobile di Montepulciano pictured here was one of the better bottle of wines we purchased during our trip, but even a carafe of house red in a casual trattoria tasted pretty darn good and was always very reasonably priced, not to say cheap. We drank white wines also, and several were very good, but Tuscany is really all about the red.
Tuscan bread: Tired of being out of bread for our breakfast on too many mornings, we finally bought these 2 great hunks of Tuscan bread, pictured in the photo, at our local grocery. From the reading I did to prepare myself for the trip, I knew that Tuscan bread was made without salt, and I didn’t expect to like it. As a professional in restaurant kitchens, every fiber in my being rebelled against the idea of bread without salt. But, actually, I adapted to the flavor and grew very fond of this bread. I especially liked the rustic texture and thick crust. So revered is the bread that every scrap is used, even when stale. Tuscan bread is truly one of the foundations of Tuscan cuisine, an essential part of ribollita (a thick porridge-like soup made of bread, beans, and vegetables), pappa al pomodoro (a thick cold soup- again, more like porridge- made with tomatoes, olive oil and stale bread) and panzanella (bread salad) as well as fettuna (toasts of Tuscan bread) topped with delights such as chicken liver paté or tomatoes, and of course- beautiful, aromatic, green olive oil. Pour yourself a glass of red wine alongside, and you’re in Tuscany!
One further note, the Tuscan bread salad we’ve been making at Dahlia since day one is not a traditional panzanella. At Dahlia, we use fresh loaves of rustic bread and grill slabs of it over apple wood, then tear it into pieces for our salad- delicious! but as I said, not traditional. Though I already knew that, traditionally, panzanella was made by soaking bread in water and then squeezing all the water out before adding the other ingredients, I never really understood this step until I encountered a loaf of day-old, not to mention 2-day old Tuscan bread sitting on the kitchen counter. Whoa! that is one tough loaf of bread!
June 26th, 2009 | No Comments »
I love my neighborhood lounge, Licorous, for its fabulous, hand-crafted cocktails, friendly staff, and roster of rockin’ small plates. It is also the perfect place to drop in after I get off work late to grab a nightcap and a little bite to eat.
The other night I had the always incredible tuna tartare with fried capers and a little dollop of caviar on each quenelle of tuna. The crisp crostini is perfect.
If you want heaven, their rotating variations on the foi gras bon bons are amazing. These were rolled in chopped pine nuts and topped with green peach. Transports you to the heavens!
June 25th, 2009 | 1 Comment »
I grilled off about 20 big beautiful shrimp on my outdoor grill at home. I tried out 4 different Rub with Love spice rubs on different shrimp skewers: Chinese 12 Spice, Spicy Tokyo, Pork, and Smoky Barbecue Rubs. I liked the Chinese 12 Spice best.
June 24th, 2009 | No Comments »
Our lunch at Zibibbo Trattoria, located in Careggi, a suburb of Florence, was one of my very favorite meals in Tuscany. (Take the 14C bus from Florence, or take a cab.) The chef-owner, Benedetta Vitali, (photo top right) along with her (now) ex-husband, helped start the famous Cibreo restaurant (more about Cibreo in another post), and she was also the pastry chef there. Years later, Benedetta left Cibreo to start her own restaurant, Zibibbo, where she also teaches cooking classes.
The lovely dining room (photo top left), with red velvet chairs and white tablecloths, is relaxed and elegant, and decorated with modern paintings of Tuscan landscapes. Sunlight streams into the room through a sky light and wine racks line the walls.
Benedetta herself came out of the kitchen to our table to explain the menu to us. Her menu is slightly unusual- both because she features a number of fish dishes (meat predominates in most Florentine restaurants) and because of the many Sicilian influences.
Paté di fegatini, or liver pate, is a standard on Tuscan menus. Benedetta’s version was suavely smooth and served with toasted brioche instead of toasted Tuscan bread. The excellent port-orange marmalade really lifted this dish out of the ordinary. Another delicious starter was a slice of fried scamorza cheese with tomatoes and bread.
The photo (center left) doesn’t do it justice, but my plate of tagliatelle agli asparagi con fonduta di Parmigiano (tagliatelle with asparagus and Parmesan fondue) was one of the best dishes of the whole trip. The tagliatelle itself was beautifully made, golden with egg yolk, and perfectly cooked- with a nice texture, almost bouncy- and of course the pasta itself was the most important thing on the plate. The rich but light tasting sauce was infused with the essence of asparagus (I assume that a very smooth asparagus puree was added to the cream and Parmesan to make the fonduta, in addition to the asparagus tips that were tossed with the pasta). Every flavor in this pasta dish- asparagus, cream, Parmesan- seemed essential to the dish. Nothing could be taken away and nothing needed to be added. Read the rest of this entry »
June 23rd, 2009 | No Comments »
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