TN: Dinner in NYC with Marshall and Diana Gelb.

Redondo Beach denizens Marshall and Diana Gelb were back in town again and that’s reason enough to party. Thanks to the MTA taking over my building’s storage room for who knows how long as they futz around with the 2nd Avenue Subway project, I have some unwanted trunks in my tiny apartment, making hosting dinner parties a little difficult at the moment. Thankfully, Christine Huang stepped in and graciously agreed to host. I made osso buco and schlepped it down to her hipster Lower East Side pad and she made everything else. Good deal if you can get it, eh? It was a feast really, with stuffed shrimp, tomato tarte tartin, roasted vegetable torta, osso buco with risotto Milanese and a jam crostada for dessert. Joining in the fun were Suzanne Camhi, Kenny Shusterman, Chris Kravitz and Jay Miller. Needless to say, good friends, good wine and good food makes for a great evening!

Cheers,

Brad

2009 Bruno Giacaso- Roero Arneis
Aromatically exuberant. Lush flavors and aromas of white flowers, citrus and peaches. There’s a pleasant lushness to the mouthfeel, but the wine is by no means fat. There’s some bitter citrus pith on the finish. I thought this would be a great match with the pesto stuffed shrimp dish, but the bitterness on the finish didn’t really work with the sweetness of the shrimp and the basil. Still, a good wine on its own. A-/B+.

1988 Müller-Catoir- Gewürztraminer Auslese, Häardter Bürgergarten
I love Gewürztraminer from Müller-Catoir and, unfortunately, it’s not that often I get to have them. In fact, I think the last time I had this ’88 was in ’99. Age has been very kind to this wine as it’s just lovely. It’s softened, rich, sweet with honeysuckle, lychee and tropical fruit syrup with enough acidity to not only prevent the wine from being cloying, but to give it grace and a seamless quality. This actually worked well with the shrimp dish. There really needed to be more of this in the bottle. Solid A-.

1993 Domaine Lejeune- Pommard “Les Argilliéres”
Very tart with no real fruit. Seems oxidized. NR.

2008 Fourrier- Morey St. Denis “Clos Sorbés”
Raspberry and cherry aromas that turn cranberry on the palate. Quite acidic with bright fruit, a bit of spice and earth. There’s a bit too much of a stemmy note on the finish. B.

2008 Rhys- Syrah, Skyline Vineyard, Santa Cruz Mountains
Blackberry and brambly fruit with a lot of spice and a little bit of olive. Way too much oak here which lends an unpleasant bitterness to the wine and I’m not convinced there’s enough fruit to absorb it all with time. A bit one-dimensional and linear. B-.

It should be noted that Jay tried the ‘ol switch-a-roo, placing the Rhys wine in the Fourrier bottle and the Fourrier in the Rhys bottle, but I can’t say anyone was really convinced given the talk about the purple color of the “Fourrier” and wondering if they had a stylistic change. The fact that Jay had fits of unprovoked and uncontrolled laughter didn’t help his cause, either.

1997 Isole e Olena- Cepparello, Toscana
This is showing quite nicely despite the fact that it had just been pulled from a rack for the dinner with no time to let it stand so the sediment could settle a bit. As a result, the wine was a touch muddled. That said, the wine showed a nice core of red fruit with baked earth, dried roses and spice. The solid structure clearly suggests this can still sit in the cellar some more. Nice length and a wonderful match with the osso buco. A-.

2004 Montevertine- Le Pergole Torte, Toscana
This is simply one of the most shut down wines I’ve ever had. It’s even tighter than a bottle tried in January of 2010 at a Montevertine dinner. Really, not much more than structure showing, so judgment reserved.

1998 Casse Base (Soldera)- Brunello di Montalcino
This was my red wine of the night. It’s bursting with delicious strawberry and cherry fruit, earth and spice, but there’s wonderful refinement and class to this wine. There’s richness, yet elegance and it’s something I always get with Soldera. Drinking well now, though no harm in holding. Solid A-.

2001 Prunotto- Barbaresco “Bric Turot”
Nice black fruit here with a bit of tar and spice. It’s well-made, though a bit polished and I wish it showed a little more personality. Seems to be just entering its drinking window. Low A-.

Some pics from the evening:

The group.

The wines. I forgot to try the Bisci and Usseglio.

Shrimp stuffed with pesto.

Tomato tarte tatin.

Roasted vegetable torta. Probably the star of the night on a night of terrific food.

Osso buco.

Risotto Milanese.

Osso buco and risotto Milanese…perfect together.

Jam crostada.

fantastic dinner and great notes Brad.
I first tasted the wine in the Rhys bottle didn’t notice it was a syrah and loved it. bright acidic and cherry strawberry fruit. it was the 08 Fourrier MSD Clos Salon
pouring the Rhys wine from the Fourrier bottle Chis Kravitz knew right away “wow what a stylistic change”. Dark black fruited syrah with a minty note WTF.

It was great to see Marshall and Diana…Marshall- once a NY-re always a NY-er.

Nice pics. Christine’s apt. sure gets a lot of use

That looked like an awesome dinner and a good time.

Yep! And we’re back there again tomorrow!

I am simply amazed at the generosity shown by Christine, Brad and their merry band. The food, wines and conversation all lent themselves to a truly memorable evening. To me, this is what wine boards and the internet are truly for…to bring people together to enjoy our mutual hobby.


Cheers!
Marshall

Couldn’t have said it better, Marshall. If Christine was cooking, had to be a good night. Thanks for the great notes, Brad----I have a bottle of the Montevetrine, a 2006 I think, and I will be sure to add about 7 years to my open estimate based on the notes here. I agree, wish there was more M-C around to try. I love their Scheurebe with some age too.

The bitterness you speak of is something I do get in Roero Arneis sometimes, particularly Giacosa. It’s not necessarily offputting and gives the wine life, but I agree, it makes it very difficult to food-match. I certainly applaud you for trying.

I miss my NYC peeps—I’ll have to find time to carve out a weekend visit sometime this year.

cheers,

Great pics and awesome menu and wine lineup. Well done!

Just for the record (since Brad doesn’t mention the date) the reason for my switch of the 2 wines is that the dinner was on April 1st. However there’s a reason I don’t play poker and when Chris commented “Wow! Fourrier has done a complete 180 on their style!” I had to hold a napkin over my face.

I liked the Fourrier much more than Brad (no surprise). The Soldera was magical. I’ve never had a Montevertine as shut down as that wine was shut down.

All the food was great but the vegetable torta was one of the best things I’ve eaten in the last year.

How about the recipe for that veggie torta?

wow. great notes and pictures. what an evening.

You eat vegetables?

I’m not Christine, but when I’ve made it, you basically just cut a lot of veggies into 1/4" thick slices, like zucchini, red onion, fennel, eggplant and halve red and yellow bell peppers, roast them off and then it’s just like making lasagna. Get a spring form pan, a large bowl or a bread pan and start layering, flip over and let set overnight in the fridge. For added flavor you can toss in some grated parmigiano reggiano in between the layers if you want to.

Hi Bill - ask and ye shall receive. “Recipe” posted in Epicurian Exploits.

There was a bit of controversy about the Pierre Usseglio CdP…personally, I liked it but some people felt it was a bit “new world.” Since it was just the regular cuvee of '98, I still felt it showed the characteristics of a true CdP.However, I would not age it much longer.

Cheers!
Marshall

Tomato Tarte Tatin please.

no kiddin Glenn-that Tomato Tatin looks great! Nice job on the pics Brad. Can’t wait to hear more when you taste Spottswoode…

A pleasure to see pictures of some obviously seriously good cooking.
I’m sorry to hear about that Lejeune, a case of this was one of my first initiations into burgundy. It tasted like christmas-but was all gone ten years ago.

Tom; That was my last bottle of the Lejeune…I wish it had shown a bit better but it wasn’t quite ad bad as Brad said.

Cheers!
Marshall

Yeah, it was. Ask Kravitz. He thought it was an abused bottle.

The recipe for the Tomato Tarte Tatin can be found here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/17/dining/17appe.html?scp=1&sq=tomato%20tarte%20tatin&st=cse
The combination of flavors are excellent and I had alwayd wanted to try my hand at it. In the article, Melissa Clark had first tried it with sliced whole heirloom tomatoes and it had come out very watery. She seemed to have solved it by using cherry tomatoes, which is what I used, but this one still came out very watery, which turned what was a perfectly flaky puff pastry crust into a soggy mess. The only thing I did differently from the printed recipe was to put the tomatoes in first and the olives afterwards as I wanted the tomatoes to show without the black spots of the olives (purely aesthetic reasons).

Perhaps the cherry tomatoes I used were more watery? Did I not cut enough vents in the puff pastry? I need to try this again as the flavors were great.