Beer and Butterbeans

Sunday August 23rd dawned a glorious day. I knew, from the moment I set foot out of the house early Sunday morning to walk the dogs, that my morning was going to involve sitting on the patio while waiting for Ann to arise. The temperature was remarkably in the low 60's and the humidity was finally down, a very pleasant change from the August status quo. It was a beautiful morning, one of those very special and rare mornings of which we see only a few a year.

I got off work early Saturday night (yes, slow nights do happen in the restaurant business) and consequently, I was up early. I knew since Saturday morning at the farmers market that my early Sunday morning project would be shelling butterbeans. Beth brought the first of her tiny crop of butterbeans to market and I grabbed a big bag of them for our Sunday dinner. Butterbeans are one of my all time favorites: I would suffer a lot for a batch of fresh butterbeans.

There is much confusion about butterbean terminology. Some people use different names for the different sizes of these beans. Some call the small beans limas and the big ones butterbeans and some people do exactly the opposite. This hardly makes sense because they are genetically the same bean. Me, I call them all butterbeans, but if I really want to call out a size difference, I'll add an appropriate adjective, as in baby butterbeans or large butterbeans. Beth's are large butterbeans as you see in the photo. Lima beans do not exist in my world.



Shelling Butterbeans

Outside on the patio, I shelled beans while Grace lay at my feet on the bluestones and stubby-legged troublemaker Charlie kept getting in the raised bed in which the squash are planted, not that it really mattered: this year the squash have foundered and we haven't got so much as a single fruit. That my toes and fingers were a bit chilled was really novel and got me thinking that I just cannot wait for fall any longer. With the days growing noticeably shorter, the locust trees already shedding leaves, and the nip in the air, I can just about taste fall.

Ann brought coffee out later when she got up and joined us in relishing the amazing weather. As I was shelling beans, I got to thinking about what we should do in the afternoon to take advantage of the phenomenal weather. For some reason, probably the linkage of fall weather and hiking in my mind, I got to thinking about the restaurant to which Kelly invited us a couple weekends ago when we were out hiking sweating on the Appalachian Trail. Although we couldn't make it then, I kept the name of the restaurant filed away. I figure that any place Kelly wants us to visit, given that she is a very fine chef, is worth our time.

So we undertook to drive down to Front Royal and try out PaveMint, styled a farm-to-street grill and micro- and craft-beer taphouse. The micro- and craft-beer part of this is important because Front Royal is one of the last bastions where Budmiller holds sway and it is important to forewarn the masses that only good beer is on tap. Already, I can see on the internet review sites that people are grumbling about the beer selection, i.e., that there is not any Budmiller anywhere to be found. My kind of place already.

Industrial Look and Feel

PaveMint is located in a recycled automotive garage in downtown Front Royal and the décor is intentionally spare and industrial as you can see in the photo with the tap wall clad in stainless steel, the recycled pallets, and the concrete bar top. A lot of people have complained about the décor on the web, but I'm one of those people who doesn't really care what the décor is: I go to a restaurant for the food and the beverage. As long as I am reasonably comfortable, the space and decoration are secondary.

For example, in St. Martin we had a great meal of grilled red snapper sitting at a picnic table at an impromptu restaurant right on the sidewalk of the Boulevard de Grande Case with a bazillion scooters going up and down the street and hundreds of people walking around celebrating Easter Monday, so a little recycled industrial isn't going to phase us. At PaveMint, I am sure that because the space is so hard it gets really noisy when there is a crowd, but at noon on a Sunday, no worries.

I suggested that we sit at the bar so that I could check out the beer selection. Glancing through the roughly 35 tap handles, I spied one for Deschutes Fresh-Squeezed IPA and I was done. This is currently my favorite beer. I keep comparing others to it and keep finding them wanting. Ann had an Allagash White, which she discovered on our visit to Portland, ME. We had tasters of Oskar Blues G'Knight, a double red IPA that is too malty for me; Baltimore's own DuClaw Sweet Baby Jesus Porter, never been a fan of chocolate or peanut butter in my beer; and Winchester's own Escutcheon Kölsch, a credible beer whose style does not appeal to me.



Starters: Falafel Bites and Crab Tots

Beer selection done, we turned to the menu which is pretty eclectic for Front Royal and is appealing to me as a chef. I like the fact that it is a simple and limited menu and pretty perfectly suited for the tiny kitchen. I decided I wanted duck confit tacos because I am always going to order duck confit tacos when I see them on the menu: reminds me of staff/chef-snacks at my own restaurant. Other than that, I told Ann to order whatever appealed to her. She ordered falafel bites and crab tots for starters and a burger for herself.

These falafels were a pretty decent take on the concept and I could snack a lot of them. Personally, I like more herbs in mine than most Americans are accustomed to, but nothing against these. The crab tots were less successful for me. I wouldn't order them again. They ended up being almost like a crab hushpuppy. I had to work hard to know that there was crab in mine and one of the three was still pretty raw in the middle. Not bad, but not memorable. I would rather pay a whole lot more and get a whole lot more crab for my money. I suspect that I am in the minority.

Duck Confit Tacos

These duck confit tacos were pretty damned decent drinking food and I could eat a lot of them, a whole lot of them. My duck confit is much more bomb that this, but these were honest and delicious tacos.

Ann's Bacon-Onion Jam Burger with Polenta Fries

After last weekend's trip to Melt Gourmet Cheeseburgers in Leesburg, I am hamburgered out for a very long time. Apparently, Ann, not so much because she ordered a burger at PaveMint. I strongly suggested she order it rare and she did. This was a good thing because it came out medium. I consider it a success when any burger I order anywhere has any pink in it, so little faith do I have in cooks.

Temperature issues aside, it was a delicious burger and much better than the burger I had at Melt. I'm sure it was a no-brainer for Ann to order polenta fries; I mean, what is a good Italian to do? These were good. I prefer a finer grind of polenta in fries because the coarser grain as in these fries makes a crust that is a bit tough and chewy. Still, kudos to anyone who puts polenta or chickpea fries on the menu.

My little nitpicks aside, I'm really happy with PaveMint and it pleases me that there is finally a decent casual restaurant in the restaurant wasteland that is Front Royal. The prices are very good for the quality. I hope this place really succeeds.

While sitting at the bar, I proposed that since we were already in Front Royal, that we go the extra 10 minutes and visit with Jeff and Kelly at Glen Manor Vineyards and to pick up a bottle of wine for dinner. On arriving, it was immediately obvious that harvest preparations are underway. Both presses are on the end of the crush pad and the north side is lined with empty fruit bins. Looking out over the vineyard, the bird netting is plainly visible.

One Week Before Harvest Begins

After an effusive greeting from Kelly, we spied Jorge and Randall out on the patio and went to say hello to them before coming back inside to taste. The Sauvignon Blanc in particular is starting to round out. I haven't tasted it in a couple of months when it was tasting super acidic. The reds are drinking really well now and we bought a bottle of Hodder Hill for dinner. After tasting, I got a glass of Sauvignon Blanc and we went back outside and sat with Jorge and Randall and caught up on the news.

And after a wonderful day out, we were tired and ready to head back to the house. I cooked the butterbeans and I enjoyed them to no end. As for the Hodder Hill, we decided to save that for another night when we were not so tired and could enjoy it more.

Cassoulet

Sunday the 11th had been in a bunch of calendars for a long while. We have been trying to get together with our winemaker friends Jim and Betsy Dolphin of Delaplane Cellars and Jeff and Kelly White of Glen Manor Vineyards for a long time. January is always a down time in the wine world (in our hemisphere) and so it is also in the restaurant business. It's the perfect time to get together. But even as slow as it is, we all run businesses and it takes planning to extricate ourselves even for an afternoon and evening of celebrating.

Cassoulet: Our Guest of Honor

Many, many weeks ago, Ann sent out the invitations and at some point well before Christmas asked me if I would make a cassoulet for the event. Cassoulet is one of my favorite winter foods and is great festive party food: you can just leave it on the counter and let each person serve himself. The timing was perfect: we just butchered a hog and lots of hog parts are required for a great cassoulet. I set about making the cassoulet on Thursday so that it would be in perfect form by Sunday.

As our guests arrived, I opened a couple bottles of Thibaut-Janisson Blanc de Chardonnay. What better for two of the best winemakers in the state than the best sparkling wine made in the state?

Headcheese and Terrine

Sparkling wine in hand, we started off the afternoon with a couple of pieces of charcuterie that I made from the aforementioned hog, butchered just before New Year's Day: truffled headcheese (on the left) and terrine with pumpkin seeds and golden raisins. That hog also furnished a few ribs, a few trimmings for garlic sausage, some miscellaneous bits, and a lot of pork stock, all of which went into the cassoulet. Without a lot of pig, it is really, really hard to make first-rate cassoulet.

Ann Made This Beautiful Loaf

To go with the charcuterie, Ann made this delicious loaf of bread. What was left accompanied the cassoulet. As always, her bread is wonderful.

Arugula with Pomegranate, Manchego, and Shallots

Cassoulet is not a lightweight food. It is a huge bowl of beans and meat swimming in rich broth. And so we needed a counterpoint, a light and crisp salad with a fairly acidic dressing. This is baby arugula, pomegranate seeds, raw minced shallots, and finely grated Manchego cheese dressed with a little pomegranate juice, Sherry vinegar, and olive oil. It was the perfect foil for the über rich cassoulet; in fact, I think most people co-mingled the two dishes on their plates.

A Good Day!

This group, we like our wine. And it was a great day to sit around the island in the kitchen and crack a few bottles and let our hair down. After the Thibaut-Janisson, we opened a 2005 Louis Carillon Puligny-Montrachet that Jeff brought. It was delicious and everything that white Burgundy should be. After that, we opened my two magnums of 2010 Grand Veneur Châteauneuf-du-Pape. What a fabulous bottle of wine that is! I have not tasted better, even in 2001 and 1998. After dinner, I opened a 1986 Raymond-Lafon Sauternes that did not show well. It is sad and tired now and that is a pity. 1986 was one of the fabulous vintages too.

Cassoulet: It's All about the Beans

Here are some tips for making cassoulet, if you dare take them from an American. You do understand that small land wars have been fought over the "proper" cassoulet in southwest France, don't you? No matter that it originated as a peasant dish of whatever beans and whatever meat scraps were at hand. And that it may actually be a Catalan dish. But still, the French are pretty touchy about this subject.

Use the best dried beans you can find. I have pretty much an unlimited number of kinds of beans at my disposal. I choose Steuben Yellow Eye beans (pictured above) because I think they are the best. I have used Tarbais beans, haricots blancs, local bird eggs, and many other kinds. Steubens rock.

I am a big fan of soaking the beans overnight in many changes of water. This helps alleviate some of the issues in digesting them. I also discard the initial cooking water. Yes, I parcook my beans to half done with a touch of rosemary and discard that cooking water before assembling the cassoulet.

The essence of the dish is pork and beans. If you have great beans and great pork, you don't need a lot of other seasonings. I use a hint of rosemary in the beans. In the cassoulet proper, I use a few bay leaves and a little garlic. Aside from that, the dish is just primal pork and beans.

In the same vein, cassoulet doesn't need a lot of vegetables. Just a bit of mirepoix (2 parts onion, 1 part carrot, 1 part celery), but make sure you sauté the mirepoix in duck fat (or barring that, lard). We process a lot of ducks at the restaurant, so there are always gallons of duck fat on hand.

Use a great stock, pork or duck or mixed, to make your cassoulet. The gelatin in super rich stocks helps form the crust on top of the cassoulet, which after it browns, you punch back down into the broth to further enrich it.

I like to punch down the crust four or five times while the cassoulet is cooking. Some French people swear by seven punchdowns but I don't think my beans need to cook that long.

Start your cassoulet days before you need it. Cassoulet is always, always better the second and third day. Make it in advance and do your final punchdown and crusting just before you serve it.

Here is my rough cassoulet process:

1. Soak the beans overnight in several changes of water.
2. Cook the beans halfway with a little rosemary and discard the cooking water and rosemary.
3. Prep a little mirepoix and garlic.
4. Assemble the meats: garlic sausage, pork trimmings, duck or confited duck legs or both, etc.
5. Heat a little duck fat and brown the meats. Remove.
6. In the same pan, lightly brown the mirepoix and mix with the beans.
7. Put half the beans and a few bay leaves in the cassole, casserole, or whatever dish you're baking in.
8. Put the meats in next.
9. Cover the meat with the remaining beans.
10. Cover all with stock.
11. Bake in a slow oven until crusted.
12. Punch down and add more stock as necessary.
13. Repeat until you're happy.

For the cassoulet above, I made a little garlic sausage from pork loin and shoulder trimmings. And I roasted all the bones from the hog and made pork stock from that. All the meat that I pulled off the bones after making the stock went into the cassoulet. I grilled fresh loin trimmings (rib eye cap) and put them in the cassoulet after cutting into pieces. And I separated a bunch of spare ribs and put them in. Finally, I used half fresh duck legs and half duck legs that I confited a few weeks ago.

For a cold January day, what better to serve friends than a glorious cassoulet?

Honeymoon: Three Doors Down, SE Portland OR and Heading Home

Saturday May 4, SE Portland OR

After munchies with beer at noon on Saturday and so-so cart food later in the afternoon, it was finally around 8:45pm that we got somewhat hungry. For our final meal in Portland, Ann wanted a simple plate of pasta so we searched the web for the closest reasonable sounding Italian joint, which proved to be at Hawthorne and 37th, called Three Doors Down.

As an aside, how nice is it to go out somewhat late and still have lots of restaurants open? Living in small town Winchester VA, we are done with our dinner service by 9pm even at the end of June when the days are the longest of the year.

That said, I judged the crowd to be slow and asked our server about it. In Portland as in Winchester, it seems you cannot compete with Mother Nature. Because it was one of the first beautiful weekends of the year, so many were people out of town at the beach or otherwise enjoying the gorgeous weather and grilling out.

We commandeered a table out on the sidewalk and people-watched for a while with a bottle of Brick House Gamay Noir, which tasted exactly as Gamay should taste. If you told me I was drinking Beaujolais, I wouldn't have argued with you. But really, I don't know enough about New World Gamay to understand how it differs from Beaujolais.


Ribbon Ridge Gamay

Because we weren't super hungry, we ordered a couple appetizers followed by a plate of pasta. Both our starters were good. First up was a large slab of grilled bread spread with goat cheese and topped with arugula and duck confit. Yep, it was every bit as good as you might imagine, though an informed palate might be wishing it had some of our house-cured duck confit on it. There's no hiding the extra flavor that ours develops over the three-month curing process.

Duck Confit, Arugula, and Goat Cheese

Next up was a board of burrata topped with tapenade, some so-called jamón ibérico, and flatbread. We enjoyed this plate, but two things confuse me. First, look at the mash up of ingredients from at least three different cultures. How does this make intellectual sense? Second, look hard at the jamón ibérico. Really, if you're going to spend that kind of money on some of the world's best ham, are you then going to cut it thick and then partially cook it?

"Jamón Ibérico", Burrata, Tapenade, and Flatbread

By the time we finished our appetizers and the server delivered our plates (they split our pasta for us; kind of them, but they needn't have) of house-made ricotta cavatelli bolognese, it was really dark out on the sidewalk. Our server had brought us a candle earlier in the evening, but it was way too gusty to keep it lit, so Ann downloaded a candle app on her iPhone and set it to flickering.

I must say that the cavatelli was deftly made and deftly sauced but was desperate for salt. And doesn't anyone make true bolognese with shredded meat anymore? Really, you're going to the trouble to make cavatelli, but you won't do the same for your meat sauce?

In the end, it was a really nice low key dinner that we shared on our final night in Portland. We were very comfortable and enjoyed sitting and talking and watching the street parade. If I lived in Portland, I think I would like this place a lot.

Sunday May 5

Sunday the 5th is a day I would like to forget. I forced myself up at 0600 local time, trying to wean myself off Pacific time to help with the transition back to work on Monday morning. In retrospect, maybe this was a bad idea. We skipped breakfast at the B&B and hurried to return our rental car and get through security to catch our early morning flight to SFO. I managed to set off the millimeter wave scanner again: I'm simply too tall for the little booth. When I looked at the monitor, it had alerted right on the top of my head, the usual location, so I got my (lack of) hair patted down. All the TSA agents here were very friendly, unlike at Dulles, and the tiny guy doing the pat down started chuckling when I had to bend down so that he could reach the top of my head.

It proved that all that hurrying was for naught. Because of weather and because of weekend runway closures at SFO for federally-mandated safety improvements, our plane was over two hours late arriving at PDX. Our plane arrived at PDX *after* we were supposed to depart SFO for Dulles; how's that for late? The flight crews were bitching too: they have to deal with runway closures all the time and naturally, the brunt of passenger fall-out lands mostly on their shoulders. And their layovers are impacted as well. The whole situation is screwed up.

The weather continued brilliantly nice and we had awesome views of Mount Hood from the tarmac while we sat at PDX and the rest of the major Cascades peaks: Ranier, St. Helens with its flat top, Adams, and the Three Sisters down near Bend once we got airborne. We also saw Shasta and the peaks in California before weather closed in a few minutes out of SFO.

Mt. Hood from the Tarmac at PDX

We managed to get re-booked on a flight out of SFO that departed not 20 minutes after we landed (and need I mention that our inbound flight sat on the ground waiting in SFO waiting for a gate to open?). When we got to the Washington departure gate, mercifully only about four gates from our arrival gate, the monitor above the gate read "Delayed - Awaiting Inbound Aircraft"), which confused me because there was a plane at the gate. The plane had just arrived and so we stood around for about 45 minutes while they turned it around, giving me time to nip over to the concession just behind us and grab some power bars and a couple sandwiches. At this point, we had been going all day without food.

"Delayed:" Just What Every Traveler Wants to See

Once we boarded, we had to sit at the gate for about 20 minutes before ground control would give us permission to join the long line of jets waiting to take off. We were about an hour on the plane on the ground before we finally got underway to DC and with weather ahead of us, we were unable to take the most direct route in. We finally arrived at just after 1am and by the time we got our car, got home, and got the dogs walked, it was 3am. Waking up just three hours later to go to work was a doozy!

This is the final post in the Honeymoon series. We had a wonderful time at the Oregon coast, in the Willamette Valley, and in Portland proper, along with some of the most fantastic weather ever to grace the first week in May in that area. What an amazing trip!

Dinner with Tom and Ann

On Sunday the 24th, a delightful late winter afternoon, Ann, Carter, and I drove out to Capon Bridge, WV to have dinner with friends Tom and Ann Matthes at their gorgeous new house situated in the Dillon's Run stream valley between two ridge lines just west of Capon Bridge proper. Wow! Do they have a beautiful single-level house on a gorgeous site. We are extremely jealous in that this is very similar to the style of house that we are hoping to build for our next (and hopefully final) home.

Still Life with Wok

Ann and I brought along a couple of bottles of Crémant de Bourgogne to start with. I really like this 100% Chardonnay bottling from Bailly-Lapierre. I keep mentioning it over and over in this blog; maybe it's because it's really nice affordable bubbly. Ann has turned a bit sour on this wine over the last year and I am not sure why. This bottle was delicious.

Carter Drinking Sprite with the Big Dogs

Tom offered Carter, now taller than his mother, a glass of Sprite in a Champagne flute so that he could be one of the gang while he sat on the sofa and surfed subways on the iPad. That's it Tom! Just what we need. Get the kid all sugared up! I do have to say that even if we have our issues at home, Carter is always a gentleman when out in public with us. Good on him! And he's a lucky kid because he gets to feast on (and loves) all this great food. What's he going to do when he gets to college and is faced with that slop?

Cuban Wedding Shrimp

We started at the counter in the kitchen with a dish that Tom called Cuban Wedding Shrimp. Though I have sincere doubts about its Cuban heritage, it is tasty. And I don't have any idea how Tom made it, but if I had to recreate it, I would make a sweet and sour marinade of orange juice, rum, vinegar, and brown sugar. Then I would sweat some peppers and onions (don't forget the garlic) and poach the shrimp and cover the whole thing in the marinade for a while. Then I would strain off the marinade and reduce it for a sauce. These shrimp were monsters too, maybe U-12s.

Pinot, Oh Me, Oh My!

Pinot fanatic that I am, imagine my surprise to see this line up on the counter when we arrived! We drank from right-to-left: Amalie Robert Pinot Meunier Willamette 2010, Buena Vista Pinot Noir Carneros 2009, Torii Mor Pinot Noir Dundee Hills 2009, and Campion Pinot Noir Carneros 2006.

Ann and I are certainly no strangers to Amalie Robert Pinot Meunier, it having been on the restaurant wine list for a while. We have tasted the 2008 and 2009 vintages of this super cranberry-colored wine, but not the 2010. I was a little disappointed in the 2010 as it seemed a touch flabbier than I recall in 2008 and 2009.

Nor are we strangers to Buena Vista Pinot, it having been on and off the wine list over the years, and we can recall a delightful afternoon sitting at National Harbor sipping this wine after a Cirque de Soleil show some years ago. It is has big and lush dark fruit with touches of cotton candy, tasting a touch more Santa Barbara to me than Carneros in this vintage. My least favorite wine of the day; Ann's favorite.

Now for my style of wine, the Torii Mor Dundee Hills. I just loved this wine and have tasted it on and off over the years. It manages that delicate balancing act that makes Willamette so special: it manages to combine the crisp acidity of Burgundy with the best new world aromatics. Delicious!

This was my first taste of Campion wines, though I know the label and know that this is the new project of Larry Brooks from Acacia. Very well made wine, though not to my taste. Big, lush dark fruit, with loads of spice.

If I had to rank these in my order of preference: Torii Mor, Amalie Robert, Campion, Buena Vista. If I had to guess about Ann's ranking: Buena Vista, Campion, Torii Mor, Amalie Robert. All wines from Charlie Fish at Murphy Beverage in Winchester.

Duck Confit Quesadillas

After the delicious shrimp, Tom made duck confit quesadillas that he served with a mayo-based sauce and a salsa of corn, tomatoes, and yellow and green squash. This makes me long so much for the grilled vegetable salsas that we do at the restaurant in the summer! I love duck confit so much!

Jalapeños

Sometimes it's the little things that catch my eye, such as this saucer of jalapeño slices. Maybe it is the contrast of the organic peppers against the industrial stainless steel. [Did you ever wonder where Jalapa is? It just occurred to me to check it out. Due east of La Ciudad and slightly northwest (and almost a suburb) of Veracruz sits Xalapa. Who knew?] Tom knows I like a little heat in my food, though jalapeños barely register on the Ed scale.

Sam I Am

During the intermezzo between the two appetizer courses in the kitchen and dinner proper in the dining room, we chatted in the living room where Sam, the chocolate lab, occupied one of the two sofas. As we were chatting, I happened to spy a couple of turkeys on the hillside across the creek about 75 yards away. We all gathered to watch them strut and shuffle through the underbrush looking for food and as they made their way north along the creek, I counted 22 of them, 20 hens and 2 toms.

Tom Stir Frying Pea and Cashew Fried Rice

After our interlude with the turkeys, Tom got to making fried rice with peas and cashews to go with his Asian pork shoulder. I *love* fried rice of any kind; I may love it better than pasta, which is saying a lot.

Action Shot

Asian Pork Shoulder with Sauce

Tom braised the pork shoulder in an Asian-inspired marinade that tasted predominantly of soy and star anise, never a bad thing! It tastes a lot like the marinade that we use for lamb and venison at the restaurant. Delicious!

Phenomenal Cheeses

And now for the stars of the show, the cheeses and bread for the final course. There is nothing finer in my book than good cheese and bread for dessert and these were excellent examples of each. Tom got the cheeses from Zingerman's in Ann Arbor. Before restaurant, I used to source a lot of things from them. I love the company, the catalog, the products, and the customer service.

From the triangular wedge on the bottom left going clockwise, the cheeses are: Montgomery's farmhouse Cheddar, L'Amuse Gouda, raw milk Stichelton, Fort St. Antoine Comté, and Detroit Street Brick. The Cheddar is smooth and delicious and is a great example of what Cheddar should be. The Gouda as you can see has a little age to it, but nothing like that of the 5-year old hard Gouda we serve at the restaurant. This one still has a smooth paste in the center and is developing caramel flavors out towards the edge: best of young and old Gouda in a single cheese. The Stichelton, while it looks and tastes like very good Stilton, cannot be so named because to be labeled as Stilton, the cheese must be made from pasteurized milk and this is made from raw milk, all the better. The Comté is a wonderful mountain cheese and is one of the finest of its kind that I have ever tasted, sweet, nutty, and complex.

The star of the cheeseboard, I left for last, the place of honor. This Detroit Street Brick, named for the pavers in the street outside Zingerman's deli, is a cheese I have never tasted before in my life, nor have I tasted anything similar. I just don't have enough superlatives in my vocabulary for this creamy goat milk cheese studded with green peppercorns and enrobed in a hint of a bloomed rind. This cheese stands with the very best goat cheeses I have ever eaten.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention that Tom served Warre's Otima 20-year old Tawny Port with the cheese. Yum! And I would be even more remiss if I didn't mention the outstanding rosemary and roasted garlic loaf that my Ann baked for the cheese course. Wonderful!

Ann's Awesome Rosemary-Roasted Garlic Bread

So after reading this, you might be jealous. You should be!

Valentine's Dinner

Like Thanksgiving, Valentine's is a big deal to Ann. Because I am in the restaurant business, we can never celebrate Valentine's Day together, so Ann has taken to hosting Valentine's dinners at our house on the Sunday before Valentine's Day.

Here is the table that Ann set, all festive in red, black, and silver, complete with gift boxes of chocolate dipped pretzels that she made for everyone.

We had a great time this year with friends Kelley and Marco Due who joined us for cocktails and then had to run, Mike and Dennis, and Jen and Dewi. Unfortunately, I failed to get photos of Kelley and Mark. Here are the rest of the characters. Mike, thanks for the photo of us!

I Like the Shot of Dennis Through Ann's Glass

Ann is not one for starting a party without a cocktail, so I reprised the grapefruity St. Germain cocktail that I invented some weeks ago. Naturally, the glasses are rimmed with red, white, and pink sprinkles! This gave me an excuse to get out the big Mexican citrus juicer. I am not a fan of single purpose cookware, but when you have to juice a lot of citrus, these guys are indispensable.

We started with three hors d'oeuvres—the plan was only two, but I brought home from the restaurant a surprise terrine that was begging to be tasted. For the first appetizer, Ann stuffed dates with goat cheese, sprinkled them with toasted panko, and warmed them in a moderate oven for about 10 minutes. These guys are deliciously and decadently rich!

Next up, I made crab-stuffed, prosciutto-wrapped shrimp. I meant to make a dipping sauce too, but that seemed to get lost in the shuffle. I butterflied the shrimp, packed a little crab into them (a dozen 16-20 shrimps took about 6 ounces of crab meat) and wrapped them in prosciutto. I broiled them 8 inches from the broiler element for about 10 minutes.

Crab-stuffed, Prosciutto-wrapped Shrimp

For the main course, we had a cassoulet made not from the traditional Tarbais beans, but from an American heirloom bean called the Steuben Yellow Eye which is famous for holding its shape while becoming deliciously creamy inside. Besides a lot of mirepoix, garlic, and fresh herbs, the other garnishes were duck confit that we put up in early January in anticipation of this cassoulet, local bacon ends, guanciale, and Surry sausage.

The guanciale (Berkshire Jowciale) and Surry sausage both come from Edwards Hams in Surry, VA, a company whose products I have eaten all my life and long-time supplier to the restaurant. We moistened the cassoulet with a stock made from the goodness that accumulates in the bottom of the roasting pans when we cook our pork belly.

 

Cassoulet

Dewi brought along a Clos la Coutale Cahors 2008, the traditional Malbec wine from Southwest France that often accompanies cassoulet. We kicked in a SonVida Argentinean Malbec 2008, a very modern style wine. I expect Cahors to be a big, dark, brooding wine, but this one was not. It was educational to taste the lighter, more traditional, and more rustic French import from Kermit Lynch against the juicy, darker, sleeker, and more modern Argentine offering. But great minds think alike: cassoulet = Malbec.

 
And what better to accompany a cassoulet than a mixed green salad and wonderful rosemary bread?

Finally, dessert queen Jen brought a bittersweet chocolate pie topped with crème fraîche. We opened a bottle of Warre's 1977 Port to go along with this. A fruitier wine would have done the chocolate more justice, but we needed a slim excuse to open the '77!

Kudos to Ann for orchestrating yet another fabulous dinner!