Pairing It Up

So I'm always looking for a good excuse to experiment with pairing food and wine.  Usually we get to choose the wine based on the food.  Sometimes I like to change it up a bit though and pair the food to the wine.  It's like designing a room based off of an accent piece.  I think that sometimes it helps to have something to anchor all the creativity.

For this Ladies' Night, I decided on a few varietals and worked from there.

I wanted to start off with a Pinot Gris, (instead of a typical Sauvignon Blanc, my least favorite type of wine).  I decided to pair it with little bite-sized hors d'oeuvres of strawberry, avocado, goat cheese and toasted pecans, all skewered together with a little toothpick.

I was a bit nervous about it as I'd gotten a few strange looks when I'd described the idea to folks, but I think it came out beautifully.  I have to admit that I came up with the idea and owe the entirety of the execution to Alisa, Maria and Liz.  The fruitiness of the Acrobat Pinot Gris went really well with the little bit sized treats.  The avocado and goat cheese balanced the mild citrus character of the wine really nicely.  This was probably my favorite pairing of the night.

After the light start, I decided to move one step heavier to a Viognier.  I served it with shrimp and mango skewers, basted with a saffron, cilantro and agave syrup mixture.  The peach tones of the Viognier went well with the summery skewers and it was smooth enough to support the freshness of the dish.

After the two whites, we decided to break into the reds.  I had a bottle of Sobon Zinfandel that I paired with chicken skewers marinated in an ancho, cocoa and raspberry paste.  The flavors worked really well together, but I definitely let them cook a bit too long.  If I were to do it again, I'd probably marinate them overnight and then cook them briefly on high heat.  A grill would be ideal, but alas, I've decided to adhere to my home-owners' association rules and not put one on my porch.  Perhaps my grill pan would do the job nicely though...

Lastly, I served little mushrooms stuffed with rendered bacon and cambozola.  This was served with a La Posta Malbec.  It was definitely a bit rich.  I think that in retrospect, it would have been better paired with a Merlot, and with something to cut the richness a bit.  Maybe portobellos with a small smear of cambozola and a small sprinkle of bacon.  I didn't manage to snap any photos of the mushrooms.

Ironically, I had made a salad with field greens, nasturtium, romano cheese, sunflower seeds and blueberries, to be served with a Pinot Noir, but I don't think we ever managed to get around to eating the salad.  I'm pretty sure we drank the Pinot Noir though...

Needless to say, it was a successful little Ladies' Night.  We wrapped it up with some Pecan Pie and ice cream that Liz brought along, and then headed out on the town to enjoy some of the late-night sunshine.

Next time I might need to work on minimizing my pours until the end of the night...

Ravioli Revelry

If I remember correctly, the topic of ravioli came up during our traumatic Romano's experience.  Something about, "we could do this better, and without the attitude..."  

This, by the way, is the curse of the foodie.  We scoff far too easily and often at meals served to us in restaurants because of our overly optimistic outlook on food preparation.  "Really?  They're going to charge me how much for this?  Have they never learned how to make _insert outrageously complicated dish_?"  This usually leads to some sort of burst of inspiration, followed by a moderately humbling experience in the kitchen, and subsequently, by an inflation of ego because we did, in fact, pull it off somehow, after a great deal of time and effort and a good dose of foul language.

I digress.  Somewhat.

We did successfully make better ravioli than Romano's.  I'm stating this as fact because no one reading this was there to argue otherwise.  Plus, our ravioli had love and attention and Romano's probably just had some hair in it.

First and foremost, we started out with wine.  House rules:  all Italian food prep (well, let's be real, any food prep) must be preceded by the consumption of red wine.  We accomplished this task with little difficulty.

I made the dough in the food processor because I wasn't up for the little egg-volcano adventure that I usually take on when making pasta.  I do consider this to be a mild form of cheating, but frankly, I'm ready to lower my own standards after cleaning up enough raw egg from my counters and floors.  Maybe one of these days I'll take the time to master the ancient art of pasta-sans-processor.  Or not.

The gals helped with the rolling of the pasta dough while I made the filling.  I chopped up some rehydrated porcini and sauteed it with some garlic and olive oil.  I mixed that with some fresh herbs, ricotta, pecorino romano, and some truffle oil.  Super tasty.  I'm going to keep that mixture in mind for the future.  I could see it being good on some crusty Italian bread, thrown under the broiler for a bit, or as a filling for stuffed bell peppers/portobellos/whatever.

On the dough side of things, Amanda and Maria rolled all the sheets to the exact thickness.  Well, except for one.  Apparently if you let the sheet dry a little bit and then you try to put it through a thinner gauge on the roller, it gets a little funky.  The ladies did a great job of fixing things up.  I'll admit, I'm not entirely sure how.  By the time we'd filled most of the ravioli, it was getting late, and the wine had been flowing.  I think the last few ravioli resembled small boiled calzones more than "ravioli" per se, but they sure tasted good...

I served the adorable little ravioli with a chanterelle marinara sauce that I had made previously and had in the freezer.  I topped it all with grated cheese and some crispy fried sage.  The result was a nice light pasta dish that was hearty enough to leave us all very satisfied.  I was a bit worried about the porcini/truffle/chanterelle combination.  That's a lot of mushroom going on.  Thankfully the individual flavors were distinctive enough that they maintained their identities.

If I make the ravioli again, I'll probably try to make the dough the day before and let the sheets rest before stuffing with filling.  I'm wondering if this would change the consistency at all.

I might also try to experiment with adding different things to the dough, like spinach, turmeric or even cocoa powder.  I think it'd be fun to change up the colors a bit and play with the sauce/pasta/filling combinations.

The evening was certainly an enjoyable one with lots of pasta shenanigans, girl talk, good wine and perhaps even a glass or two of Franzia thrown in for character.