Today our only SFWCF event was a Cooking School demo and tasting of three dishes by Charles Dale, executive chef at Terra restaurant at Encantado Resort. He started with an exposition of his culinary background, it was very interesting. Then he started with the preparation of his Smoked Trout Nachos. He did each of his dishes essentially from scratch. He started with whipping crême frâiche, dicing and adding ripe avocado, then into a blender with lime juice and a little salt. Then he fried the flour tortilla chips. He put two tortilla chips on each plate. There were twenty guests, eventually. He put some sauce on each chip, and a little on the plate. Then he topped the sauce & chip with pieces of smoked trout, from an Idaho farm that he smoked at his restaurant. This was topped with Chipotle Caviar from Tsar Nicoulai. It was very tasty with a 2008 Alma Rosa Pinot Gris.
The next course was a Butternut Squash, Poblano Chile, Chimayo Red Chile Grilled Corn, & Smoked Gouda Risotto. He also did this from scratch - cooking the rice with shallots and butter, then adding chicken stock. When the rice was a nice al dente he added the finely diced squash, diced chiles, corn, and grated cheese. After stirring all this together, he added more butter, cream, and stock to make a creamy, moist risotto. This also was very good with a lightly oaked 2006 Alma Rosa Chardonnay, El Jabalí Vineyard, with no malolactic fermentation.
Third was French-Chinese-Southwest fusion dish of duck confit on blue-corn pancakes, with a chipotle-hoisin sauce and shredded carrots and cilantro. The sauce and pancakes were also made from scratch. This was enjoyed with a 2006 Alma Rosa Pinot Noir La Encantado Vineyard. The rich but not over-the-top Pinot was enjoyable with the duck confit.
Richard Sanford joined us in the middle of he second course and gave a nice exposition of his Alma Rosa vineyard growing techniques during Charles’ prep of the third course.
It was a great way to start the Fiesta.
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