Last night we went to Trattoria Nostrani to celebrate my birthday a day early (since they’re not open on Sundays). We started with a lovely soft-shelled crab appetizer - a single medium crab sautéed and on a tomato, herb, brown butter sauce. It was very good with a 1999 Raveneau Chablis ‘Butteaux’ - light yellow-gold in color; rich nose and flavors of stony white fruit with a touch of oak; full rich mid-palate of stony fruit with good acidity, to pair with the crab and sauce; and a long stony fruit finish. The Chablis was also nice with our mid-courses of Carollee’s Asparagus with Toscano Sauce (what I had on Carollee’s birthday) and my shrimp with wilted spinach, tomato, and cannelini beans.
Then Eric brought us a 2004 Jean Foillard Morgon ‘Côte de Puy’ to have with our mains of slices of duck breast in a sour cherry sauce on a folded buckwheat pancake filled with herbed cheese. The Morgon - dark ruby in color; a little hard initially, but opening (with time and the food) to pleasant nose and flavors of flowery, spicy strawberries and cherries. a pleasant, balanced mid-palate, and a medium long fruity finish. It was quite good with the rich duck.
For dessert we had a 1997 Felsina Vin Santo with a cookie plate for Carollee and the semifreddo trio for me. The Vin Santo was rich and caramelly and good with both desserts. Since the Vin Santo was a 500ml bottle we shared some of it with Jinny and Jack Johnson and their son, Tom, who were seated next to us.
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