Fresh and Natural all the way

My husband has an organic herb and vegetable garden of which I use regularly.  I love the smell of fresh organic anything, especially herbs.  Today, believe it or not, was my first time using fresh oregano.  I chopped it and put it in a pasta salad I was making for lunch.  I had always used the organic dried crushed stuff, which isn't bad, but a lot can be said about using fresh ingredients for recipes.  Fresh tastes better, definitely.  I find myself being very conscious of what I and my family eats and drinks lately.  Which brings me to the subject of organic and biodynamic wines.  Much care and dedication goes into making these types of wines.  It takes about 3 years to convert an established vineyard, and strict regulations need to be followed.  Both of these methods of viticulture focus on working with nature, along with preserving and enhancing the soil the wine grapes grow in.  Cow manure, Yarrow and Chamomile flowers, among other things, are used to enhance the organic matter already in the soil.  The theory is natural ingredients in...beautifully balanced wines out.  The difference is evidenced in the taste..and my pasta salad definitely tastes better with the fresh oregano.  Here are some producers of organic and biodynamic wines.  Try them and see if you can taste the difference from conventionally farmed wine grapes:

Napa Valley ~ Grigich (of the Paris Wine Tasting of 1976 fame) ~ Quintessa
Washington State ~ Pacific Rim
Sonoma ~ De Loch ~ Benziger
Alsace France ~ Zind Humbrecht

By the way I'm feeling very Carrie Bradshaw-ish today, because I'm writing this from my favorite Starbucks.  I need to do this more often.

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Tasting and Pondering

I spent my Saturday evening with a group of women who know more about the ways of the world than I do. Women who have traveled to Europe, the African Continent and beyond, picking up knowledge as they traveled along. They asked me to host a wine tasting party for them. So I took them on a trip to northern France sampling the grape varietals Riesling, Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc and Pinot Noir, all from Alsace. My wine classes are more conversational than lecturing. I feel you get more out of learning if you just have a simple, “on the same level”, conversation. I started with a talk on the history of wine and the grapevine and how it spread throughout the world, then on to the Alsace wine region and its history, then to the tasting of wine, which I have feeling was their most favorite part of the evening. Wine tasting is very subjective and I get great pleasure when I hear someone identifying a taste or sensation they had never had when tasting a wine before. I think this is because most people drink wine as opposed to tasting and pondering what‘s in the glass. I suppose we do that sometimes in life, go through instead of actively participating. We had a lot of fun conversing and learning and our evening was spent in full awareness of the wines we were having…quite an experience for all of us. At the end of the evening a few of the women from the class said that they had been to a lot of places and a lot of wine tastings, and that my wine class was the best they had ever been to. What an honor!

Taste and ponder one of the wines we had Saturday evening Pierre Sparr 2007 Riesling....

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Great Friends and Olive Oil Cake

We had a some great friends over to dinner last night, who are always and inpiration to me.  They are couple who have been married for at least 20 years and still treat each other with respect and kindness as though they had just met the day before.  They are self-employed business people that have weathered many storms together.  I leaned from them that you always move forward, no matter what, keep your eye on what is and who are important to you, and look to the end when setting goals.   If we keep this in mind, in the end you will have a life that is fulfilling, meaningful, and a beacon for all to live by.  All of this learning was done over a European style long dinner that lasted until the wee hours of the morning.  The dinner consisted of grilled skirt steak infused with lemon olive oil, and Mediterranean style pasta salad, spinach salad, and for dessert, Olive Oil Cake, recipe complements of Native Food and Wine. The wine we shared was an Austrian Gruner Veltliner, it was fruity and light, just like our evening.  You know, I had one of those epiphany's last night..I have my wine consulting company, The European Wine Table.  I think I may need to promote the virtues of  The American Wine Table also.  Food, wine, family and friends is a universal language and Americans  know how to do those well.  We've put a new spin on traditions brought here and have created completely new ones.  I'm going to search those traditions out and report back.  In the mean time, here's the recipe for the Italian Olive Oil Cake.  It is so good...

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Food and Wine Travel...and Tarte Tatin too!

This entire day I have been watching the new Cookng Channel.  It's a spin-off, from what I can tell, of the Food Network.  The Cooking Channel is all about the how-to and where-from of cooking.  So far today I've learned how to make Tarte Tatin, the correct way.  I've traveled to India and learned all about their various spices for enhancing foods.  I've gone to France and learned how to make Brown Butter Fish.... and I've even gone to Naples and learned how to make Pizza Fritta or fried pizza.  What a great channel.  I'm glad someone got it...food travel without leaving the comforts of your home!  Which is one of the reasons I teach wine.  So many places you can go just by tasting wines from different regions.  I'm taking a group to Alsace, France this month, via a wine tasting party.  They are beginners with wine and I feel that if you want to learn about French wines, learning through Alsace is a great way to start.  The wines are light and fruity, easily identifiable, and the grape varietal names are on the labels.  Tarte Tatin  is one of the delicious desserts from the region so I think I'll make that for the class to have with their wines.  Grape varietals to look for from Alsace are; Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc (all whites), Riesling, and Pinot Noir (red).  Here's the recipe for Tarte Tatin.  Enjoy it with an Alsace Riesling or Pinot Blanc, shear heaven!  And check out the new Cooking Channel.

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We are all the Same

Last week I went to the premiere of Sex and the City 2. I was invited to taste and review the new cocktails that Moet & Chandon (Champagne) created for the girls. It was a star studded Atlanta event, full of bling and photo ops. While standing among all of the celebrities I knew from television and the ones I didn’t know, sipping my favorite of the 4 cocktails, the Fashionista…..(Moet Champagne with a splash of pomegranate juice), I felt a little intimidated. But as I looked at each person while they were smiling for the cameras getting their photos taken, I had an epiphany…celebrities are no different from you and me. They are people just like we are, who have a “jobs“, just like we do, which makes them no more important in this world than we are. After that realization, my feeling of intimidation left instantly, and I stood proud knowing that wife, mother, and wine consultant was how I chose to show up in this world At that point the only thing that was really important to me was seeing the movie. And what a great movie it was. Moet & Chandon was the drink of choice throughout the movie… the girls always did have great taste. After the premiere I felt like a person with a new perspective. I was also a person on my way to Steak and Shake. Just to let you know, movie premieres don’t serve food, so if you ever decide to go to one eat before you go. You know being a celebrity is not all it’s cracked up to be! And in honor of my new perspective, I made a lemon tart to go with  Moet & Chandon Champagne. Here’s the recipe:  Lemon Tart

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