I love it when friends come to visit - Cheeses, scallops, shrimp, ribeyes, Cabernet, Syrah and more!
March 29, 2008 by michael
I love it when a good friend comes to visit. It’s a great excuse to open a few nice bottles of wine and make a big dinner. Last night my friend Brandon drove down from Michigan for dinner and a 4 day mini-vacation. About 10 minutes after pulling into the driveway, we went to a local wine store for a wine tasting and to stock up for the weekend. From there we hit Whole Foods where we found some cheese, sweet potato’s, scallops, collosal shrimp, beef ribeye steak and a bison New York strip steak.
The scallops were seared with salt/pepper and dried mint and served in a sherry deglaze with pan juices and some butter. The shrimp were fried in duck fat and served with a spicy homemade cocktail sauce. The ribeye and strip steaks were grilled medium-rare (more rare than medium) and served with mounds and mounds of sweet potato fries. Everything turned out great and best of all, Brandon loved his first Bison steak and all the wine- life is good!
As far as liquids go, we enjoyed the following:
Kuhnhenn Raspberry Eisbock: Warren, Michigan made beer that is one of the top 20 in the world. It was outstanding, and although pricey ($13 / .2 liter bottle), is worth it for any beer lover. I don’t do ratings on beer, but this would be the equivalent of a 97+ point wine.
2001 Silver Oak Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon - $95: Silver Oak is a bit overrated, but it’s still a good wine, just not worth the money. Good flavors and elegant, but a bit off balance on the finish - lacks real fruit character. My rating: 89 pts
2002 Saint Cosme Cote-Rotie (Syrah from Northern Rhone) - $44: Raspberry, barnyard, cherry, spice. A bit off balance and lacking of real fruit character or a good finish, but drinkable. Poor QPR- this one’s a pass. My rating: 87 pts, PV
2005 Bravante Trio (Cab Sauvignon, Cab Franc, Merlot) - $38: Young, ripe fruits, good concentration. Vanilla, cedar, blackberry, good flavors, balance. Great value. Second bottle with consistent rating. My rating: 91-92 pts, GV
And we finished the night off with a glass of The Balvenie Doublewood 12 year scotch!
I can’t wait for tonight which involves volumes of Tapas, Champagne, 12 Spanish wines and dinner with 14 wine enthusiasts who are great people and good friends. Tasting notes and recap to come soon!
Good gracious, why was I not invited to this little reunion, sounds great. I think Silver Oak is also overrated and needs 15 years to age just to get rid of that edge that aging it in American Oak gives it. However, on that note…my husband had a patient who worked for Silver Oak and was able to get as much Silver Oak as he wanted for three dollars a bottle. They bottle it under an employee label but it’s the same stuff. We were lucky enough to get two cases and dahling let me tell you, for 3 bucks it WAS DIVINE!
Great article! If you’re looking for good restaurants in the area check out http://www.foodjoker.com. Great selection of places to eat and great site.