Upon arrival in Vermont the last thing we wanted to do was go shopping, so instead we played with Milo all over the place and made do with what we brought and what the house had to offer from the cupboards (and cellar) for dinner. A can of tomatoes plus dried porcini, dried tomatoes, a few dried herbs, onion, wine, and chives from the garden became the sauce, and I went out and picked a bunch of dandelion greens which I cooked in a pot with sweated onion, dashi, and grüner vetliner (left over from September- really.) One of the great pleasures of this house is the ability to walk out the door and pick things to eat; granted dandelion greens are not that exotic, but later in the summer when the fraises de bois and then blackberries are ripe there’s nothing on planet Earth that’s better.
We had this simple feast with a Hollerin’ E by Sine Qua Non which tasted for all the world like candied pineapples and hazelnuts- like a great white Hermitage but without the minerality and with some of the California decadence that the great Chardonnays have, then we followed it with a 2000 Gemstone which despite its expansive fruit still has a cedary structure which sets it apart from your average high-end Cali cab.
