I hope those of you who are celebrating Passover are having a lovely holiday; and that those of you who will celebrate Easter, will have a wonderful holiday this weekend.
Now among Christian peoples, there are different traditions (and even different dates) for celebrating the holiday. I remember my first holiday abroad was spent during the Easter Holy Week in Madrid. I was fascinated by the processions, the statues, the flowers and the flagellants of Semana Sancta!
New Orleans is a largely Catholic city, whose history and traditions are inextricably tied to the church in which I was raised. In The Catholic Church, as opposed to other, less hierarchic churches, there are authoritative answers on issues of law and custom. So it was not insignificant to the locals, when The Archbishop of New Orleans, definitively qualified Alligator in the seafood family for the purposes of Lenten abstention from meat. It seems that cold blooded creatures like frogs and turtles are also considered fish for this purpose. Now in New Orleans, that's a big deal. You can't swing a dead cat (definitely meat; and cat-swinging is probably prohibited on Good Friday) in New Orleans without hitting some alligator meat.
Anyway, the whole thing just fascinated me. I love New Orleans. I love old traditions like this. So we're going to participate in a New Orleanean Good Friday tradition. Catholics are supposed to fast except for one meal on Good Friday. That meal should not contain meat, but can contain fats and juices of meat or soups, gravies or sauces derived from meat.
Friday and Saturday in Stage Left, we're going to serve a special of Shrimp and Alligator with Black Risotto Appetizer ($16) or an entree ($32). In case you're wondering, I suggest the traditional glass of Madeira from our excellent list. Make a reservation here or by calling 732-828-4444.
Glen Grant 28 Yr 1979 Speyside Single-Barrel Bottling from The Malt Trust
Estimated retail price: $239 per bottle We're pouring one ounce for $8
Glen Grant was founded by two former illegal distillers and smugglers. In 1840, brothers John and James Grant decided to take out a license. With the sea and port of Garmouth nearby, the River Spey at its feet and barley-growing plains nearby, all the basic ingredients of malt whisky were close at hand. This time the distillery was legal. James ‘The Major’ Grant, born in 1847, inherited the business in 1872. He was to prove himself a worthy successor.
The Major was a legendary traveler and innovator. He was the first man in the Highlands to own a car. Glen Grant was the first distillery to have electric light. And he introduced the tall slender stills and purifiers that create the distinct malty flavor and clear color that defines Glen Grant whisky to this day. By the time he died in 1931, his distillery had become one of the most famous in the world. Douglas MacKessack, his grandson, succeeded him.
While Glen Grant is no longer family-owned, it's tall stills continue to produce the singular malty, light colored whiskies that made it famous. This is a numbered bottle (#176) from a single barrel of 1979 whisky that was dumped in 2007 and has been resting in bottle since. That will come to an end on Thursday when I, with my own two hands, open the cork and pour some for you (and me).
Next week, we'll have a very special spirit indeed: Cognac Delamain "The Reserve de la Famille." This rare single barrel bottling would retail for about $550.
I passionately,
passionately love great aged White Bordeaux. All great sommeliers love white
Bordeaux -ALL OF THEM. I cannot figure, for the life of me, why it is not
widely popular in America. Some wines need explanation and a frame of reference
to understand and appreciate their subtle nuance; not so, aged white Bordeaux!
You just put your nose in the glass and say OMG!
Here are some defining
characteristics of truly great white Bordeaux:
Thursday April 18, 2013; Tasting at 6, Dinner at 7
I've recently come across a treasure-trove of great bottles, with age, and at very good prices. I'm just beside myself, and to show them off we're going to pour them in a tasting and dinner on Thursday April 18.
What??? No Red Wine??? Right, No Red Wine! AND We're Going To Blow Your Doors Off!
We'll have a tasting of five wines before dinner, followed by five more whites with dinner. This will include Chateau Suduiraut 1994 Sauternes (which is a part of Bordeaux) and two vintages of my absolute favorite, Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte.
Hors d'Oeuvres During Tasting Walk-Around White Bordeaux Tasting
Foie Gras Terrine with Prosciutto di Parma, Raisin, Hazelnut Chateau Suduiraut 2004 Sauternes
Turbot with Indian Spices, Roasted Nuts and Herb Crème Fraîche Chateau Monbousquet 2005 Chateau Larrivet Haut Brion 2007
Roasted Poussin with Garlic, Roasted Mushrooms and Poultry Glace Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte 2006 Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte 2005
At New Jersey’s Catherine Lombardi restaurant, when it comes to selecting wines to enhance cocktails, the quality, style, and variety are just as important as when pairing wine with food.
Why do people choose to adulterate fine wines, beers, and spirits? For variety’s sake. It’s the very spice of life.” So concludes the opening paragraph of Gary Regan’s The Joy of Mixology. It’s also very likely that the world’s first cocktails were rigged up from poor quality wine (and beer) and “improved,” aka masked, with additives.
Throughout the centuries, wine has played an integral role in cocktail culture. Brandies like Cognac, Armagnac, and Pisco are derived from wine. Champagne adds finishing flourishes, and still table wines swim in punch bowls and float as garnishes. Fortified wines, like Port, Sherry, and Madeira, figure prominently, and to craft properly two of the world’s most famous cocktails, the Martini and the Manhattan, the aromatized wine vermouth is obligatory. Really, it’s nothing new. Hippocrates may have been one of the first to make flavored wine, rather for medicine than tipple, as we know it.
Francis Schott, co-owner of Catherine Lombardi (a Wine Spectator Best of Award of Excellence recipient since 2005) in New Brunswick, New Jersey, and his head bartender, Chris Stanley, are deeply familiar with the history of wine in cocktails. Schott begins by mentioning that Richard “Cicero” Cook’s Oxford Night Caps, printed around 1827, notes that a Bishop cocktail, which uses red wine or ruby-style Port, appears in print as early as 1447 in the expense records of the institution that would become Oxford. Punches, which featured wine in the bowls of aristocrats in addition to the booze of sailors, became vogue in the 1600s. At the end of that century through 1860, American colonists popularized flips, in which they often used fortified wines. During this time the sangaree, which morphed into sangria in the 1960s, appeared in 1774. With a few centuries of such drinking traditions well established, the word “cocktail” first appeared in print in 1806, according to Dale DeGroff in The Craft of the Cocktail.
Today’s booming cocktail culture pulls inspirations from old trends, many of which use wine. However, successfully using wine in cocktails isn’t necessarily obvious or easy. First, there is the question of the wine’s intended effect. Wine can stretch a cocktail, provide acid, pop aromatics, add sweetness, or do several of these things at once. Schott states that the biggest challenge is the body. Bubbly can finish a cocktail beautifully, and fortified wines stand up easily. However, spirits and bitters effortlessly overwhelm still table wine’s texture and flavor. One method of overcoming this is to float a still wine on top of the cocktail.
“For wine to have integrity in cocktails, it has to be a cocktail where the wine matters,” declared Schott. He went on to explain that good bartenders design recipes based on brands rather than wine or spirit categories: “Gin is not gin! Plymouth is Plymouth, and Beefeater is Beefeater. Plymouth is more elegant, floral, and pretty,” Schott elaborated. “Beefeater is more foursquare, peppery, and structured. Dolcetto is red wine, and so is Nebbiolo. But, they are not interchangeable!”
This point was illustrated as the duo prepared two variations on a Regent’s Punch to elucidate. Regent’s Punch is finished with sparkling wine, an ingredient often haphazardly substituted. Alongside each version, a pony glass of the bubbly used was served. From color to texture to flavor, clear differences emerged between the drink topped with Doyard Champagne Vendémiaire Premier Cru Brut NV versus the other with Varichon & Clerc Privilège NV. Both are Blanc de Blancs, but the Champagne is 100 percent Chardonnay, while the crémant is a blend of Chardonnay with other varieties. The biggest dissimilarity is the different winemaking. The Champagne’s primary fermentation occurs in oak barriques (rather than tanks), and the wine rests on its second fermentation lees for four years. These two wines add body and flavor, which surfaced in the cocktail. Each was tasty, but they clearly differed in style and price tag.
Still wines pose even more of a challenge. White wines in particular are tricky because, while those used in cocktails tend to be fragrant and lighter bodied, they can easily become lost in the fuller-bodied, spirit-driven whole of the prepared drink. Stanley mentioned that his European Holiday cocktail required tinkering with a whole line-up of Rieslings to perfectly blend in the white wine with the other flavors and to find just the right amount of balancing residual sugar and acidity.
When it comes to still red wine, the float is king. The feasibility of floating wine depends on the specific gravity of the rest of the drink. The wine must be lighter, to sit on top. (As an aside, Schott shared a great trick for floats. Rather than pouring the wine over the back of a bar spoon—the commonly taught way, slowly pour the liquid into the bowl of the spoon positioned on the surface of the drink. This “arrests the wine’s vertical motion” and creates a “crisp line that allows the float to remain on top of the drink like the head of a well-drawn pint,” says Schott.)
In another wine-to-cocktail tailoring experiment, Schott and Stanley sampled five different reds floated on Cosmopolitan Delights, a concoction of Hennessy Cognac, Orange Curaçao, lemon juice, orgeat, and red wine. The Hilberg-Pasquero Vareij, a light aromatic blend of Brachetto and Barbera, popped the aromatics, but its tannins proved too wimpy to properly structure the drink. By contrast, a Barbaresco hammered the drink with tannins. A California Petite Sirah imparted heaviness and an unpleasant cherry Cold-Eeze flavor. A Veneto Merlot introduced capsicum aromas. At last, it was the Schiavenza Dolcetto d’Alba 2009 that provided the perfect combination of brightened aromatics, mild tannins, and acidic lift. All but the Barbaresco were drinkable, but only the Dolcetto was truly excellent.
Where wine and liquor really come together is in one of the oldest wine cocktails: the punch. In the early 1700s, when aristocrats copied the punch from sailors, they rendered them effete by adding wine. Weightier punches use fortified wines, as in Admiral Russell’s Excess Punch. Lighter ones, like the Fourth Regent’s Punch, use Champagne.
Punches are stable and designed to remain delicious as their ice melt incorporates. (An ice block resting in a punch keeps it cool as it is enjoyed.) Punches’ alcohols vary, but they average 20 percent rather than most cocktails’ 40 percent. Schott mentioned that many establishments new to punch don’t immediately grasp that it must continue to taste good as it stands. “You can’t just scale up any cocktail and put it in a punch bowl. It will either taste too strong at the outset or too weak 20 minutes later.” Schott also advises that, since Champagne punches do not retain their bubbles long, adding more bubbly refreshes them. “A great punch is a living, evolving thing!”
Several other cocktail categories incorporate wine. Resembling punches are cups. When they were invented, cups were an iced beverage resembling punch, using whatever wine was on hand (usually something produced nearby), and were served from a pitcher. There are also flips. Historically, these were warm drinks compounded with eggs, sugar, and spice. In modern parlance, the term is often applied to any drink shaken with a whole egg. There are also cobblers and tikis, which both use ice (always in cobblers and most of the time in tikis) and come in wildly imaginative variations.
Interestingly, cocktailians embrace wine, yet many wine imbibers—even adventurous ones—approach spirits with caution. Schott suggested a few concoctions to encouraging crossover imbibing. One of them, the Negroni Sbagliato, Schott called “a gateway cocktail for wine drinkers.” Translated as “Botched Negroni,” Prosecco replaces the gin typically mixed with red vermouth and Campari. The resulting alcohol is substantially lower, yet the intense aromatics remain.
Of course, a fine list of creative and delicious cocktails often doesn’t sell itself. In a restaurant, rather than a cocktail bar, the sales approach is especially important. Punches, served in beautiful decorative bowls placed on the diners’ table, are popular at Catherine Lombardi. Schott teaches his staff to quickly assess a table upon their first approach and to “utter in the first breath the suggestion of a punch bowl.” Like a magnum, delivering a punch bowl provides a show in the dining room. Performance effects aside, a punch bowl provides the first beverage or two to a table of four or six, quickly setting the table in a festive mood and reallieving the server of frequent rechecks on drinks early on as the party settles into the evening. Better yet, if the bar is buzzing, a bartender’s drink-making and paperwork time for a few rounds has been reduced by at least half when a punch bowl goes out.
With a cocktail list as extensive as the one at Catherine Lombardi, training takes on even greater importance. Schott handles this by inviting his staff members to enjoy a drink at the bar each night after their shifts. Staff must change into street clothes, and they are welcome to stay for a second drink, offered at a discount. The critical point is that the beverages offered are exclusively from Catherine Lombardi’s specialty cocktail list. Effectively, Schott builds his cocktail lessons into this opportunity to enjoy the restaurant’s front-of-the-house experience as a guest.
While Stanley mentioned that wine cocktails receive little explicit demand per se because people often are not aware of their beverages’ components, Schott sees bartenders making more wine-driven cocktails to deliver great flavor without the elevated alcohol. Besides offering diversity, this strategy may allow a customer to enjoy an extra beverage, and it may allow a bartender to inconspicuously slow down an overly enthusiastic consumer or satisfy a guest who wants to enjoy cocktails while going easy on the alcohol.
Whether wine stretches, sweetens, acidifies, fragrances, or flourishes a cocktail, bartenders and imbibers can enjoy a seemingly infinite list of explorations. The key to success is taking the extra time—and the money—to tailor cocktails to the best wines.
In honor of St. Patrick's Day this Sunday, we will be offering a Curragh (look it up or come ask me in person) of Irish Cocktails, beginning on Friday and through the end of the month. These will be offered at The Cocktail Bar at Catherine Lombardi at the very special price of $9 on Friday. On Sunday (the High Holy Day Itself) if you can answer either one of the following questions, your first cocktail is on us. 1) What the heck is a Curragh? It has two meanings. We need both. 2) Why did we name the St. Francis Cocktail (Hint: It has nothing to do with the new Pope). There is one ingredient to which the name refers. What is it? You have until Sunday to find out!
Saint Francis Cocktail (Irish Whiskey, PX Sherry, Yellow Chartreuse, Lemon, Cinnamon & Rose Petals)
Friday evening we will offer all of these tasty libations for $9 and through the rest of the month at $12 (unless you know the answers on Sunday). These are delicious!
We will pass light hors d'oeuvres from 6:30 on Friday the most tasteful cocktail enthusiasts of The Garden State will be in attendance, as is their custom. We hope to see you there.
Estimated retail price: $145 per bottle We're pouring one ounce for $4.50
Some of the buildings on the Strathmill Distillery complex are actually older than the distillery itself - they were once part of a corn mill. This mill was founded in 1823 while the conversion to a whisky distillery took place in 1891. At this time the name was still Glenisla-Glenlivet. The conversion from a corn mill to a distillery was probably inspired by the whisky boom of the late 19th century. Between 1890 and 1899 almost thirty malt whisky distilleries were founded. A second pair of stills was added at Strathmill in 1968. At this time the spirit stills at Strathmill were also fitted with purifiers on their lyne-arms (the pipes running down from the top of the still) to help produce a lighter type of spirit. In recent times, most of the output of Strathmill has made up the high point of many a blended whisky. Strathmill is a Speyside distillery that get's its water from local springs and The Isla river. I don't have a lot of experience with Strathmill and I am very much looking forward to opening this bottle.
The Malt Trust is a relatively new independent bottler of single malts that has been releasing some really well regarded bottlings. All Malt Trust whiskies are dumped in single barrels and without chill filtration or additional coloring.
Next week in The Spirits Project: Delamain Cognac Reserve de la Famille.
As March approaches every year, we begin to see caricatures of Irish menus
popping up all over the place. While in the pantheon of great food cultures,
Ireland threatens neither Italy nor France, there is good food in the land of my
forebears, and a good food culture that deserves more than the caricature of
green beer, and “kiss-me-I’m-Irish” corned beef and cabbage.
Éire is an island nation. Salmon is a staple and the prawns of Dublin Bay
have been a delicacy from time immemorial. Hormone-free cattle graze on verdant
green fields and give rich milk that later becomes earthy, cultured butter and
aged, ripened cheese. Lamb, of course, holds pride of place in Irish cuisine.
Boxty is somewhere between a potato pancake and an Irish Crepe. Not dainty, but
delicious.
For two weeks, around St. Patrick’s Day (from March 11 to March 24), we will
offer the following menus in Stage Left. Some ingredients are sourced from
Ireland and all are inspired by the food of the Emerald Isle.
A Dignified Irish Tasting Menu
Potato Leek Soup.....with Prawn
Carpaccio of Irish Salmon.....with Salmon Roe, Horseradish, Preserved
Lemons