We had a few of the crew over for dinner, and everyone brought something. We began with the peanut soup, enhanced with cayenne and togarashi, and complemented incredibly with the rest of the Moulin Touchais. It was like peanut butter and jelly all over again. Crazy good when the spice and rich peanut flavors collided with the big tangy-sweet grapey wine. Pure pleasure. Next, John’s poke of gorgeous ‘ahi and Liz’s collard rolls with carrots and tamarind dipping sauce. For these, I opened a 1996 Colin-Deleger Chassagne Montrachet that tastes like a Kistler chardonnay’s unrequited sex dream.
Following this, we actually sat down and had hijiki-saffron fettucine (the dough was in the freezer from last month) with a truffle butter sauce and sliced black truffles. We opened a 1997 Gevrey-Chambertin “Les Cazetiers” by Dominique Laurent that was sadly corked and undrinkable. To our rescue came John, with his 2003 Alion Ribera del Duero (made by the dude from Vega Sicilia, from his own vineyard) that started out good and got better and better, especially with the main course: John’s baked sea bass and tilefish with porcini powder with Chris’ turnips with onion and vanilla, my slow-braised fennel and sautéed pak choi, and John’s salad. Everything went so insanely well together; it was like one giant perfect plate of food. To finish, we had a 2005 White Barn pinot noir and boucheron de chèvre on baguette. We’re so lucky to have such friends, and to have this kind of meal be the standard for a pot luck.