While quaffing a bracing bit of white wine from the French Savoie, I inhaled my new favorite appetizer at Soif. Served in a rustic glazed dish, fat gigande beans were joined by pancetta and those sexy end-of-the-season tomatoes that taste like a Mediterranean smile. Served warm, this dish ($6) was enough for two to enjoy, along with some crisp wine. The more minerals the better. I’m thinking Grüner Veltliner – the wine poised to bump Chardonnay back to the Stone Age.
Worth waiting for! These are luscious examples of what a Mediterranean climate, ingenuity and lush, organically-composted soil can do. They come from the sun-drenched Ben Lomond gardens of my friends Mateo and Francesca.
Green Zebra, Matina, Heart of Compassion, Black Cherry, Sungold — a few of the names of these amazingly flavorful, intensely ripe September tomatoes.
If you’re not lucky enough to have a garden contact like mine, then hit the farmers markets this month.
There’s a bit of cinematic poetry now showing at The Nick – for the last week! – called Man on Wire.
In spellbinding moves, the film tracks the planning behind an astonishing feat of mad, bravura creativity by French wire walker Phillipe Petit. With the help of friends, collaborators and mercenary hippies, Petit plotted an extraordinary bit of performance art – a 45 minute mid-air walk between the two towers of the former World Trade Center. More ephiphany than documentary, the present-day Petit’s passionate narration of the steps leading up to this amazing, and illegal, event is the voice over to footage taken back when the event happened in 1973.
When the incredible walk happens – even though filmgoers know what’s coming – it is sheer, profound poetry. Just to see what this man does – a supernatural act, a once-in-a-lifetime revel. Dionysian in the extreme. The views of Manhattan alone will bring tears to your eyes. Take a look at this image! Sometimes a picture IS worth a thousand words.
Run out this week and see it!
Pomodori Time! The 17th Annual NatureSweet Carmel TomatoFest®, happens once again on Sunday, September 14, 2008,12:30 pm, at the magnificent Quail Lodge Resort in Carmel.Founder/Director of the TomatoFest®, Gary Ibsen, announced that 60 of America’s finest chefs will attend this year’s TomatoFest to offer guests the opportunity to enjoy world-class cuisine featuring heirloom tomatoes in an unpretentious, harvest-celebration atmosphere. Ibsen says, “Our gathering of culinary artists will showcase a range of unforgettable epicurean creations from classical to innovative (more…)
The infamous Le Cigare Volant, now in its 21st vintage, was the wine that launched Rhône Ranger Randall Grahm into the oenological stratosphere. A brilliant riff upon the Châteauneuf-du-Pape blend of grenache, syrah, mourvedre and a few dabs of this and that, the Cigare has always proved reliable, classy, and in some years, great. 2004 — the year of the latest Flying Cigar release – might be one of the great ones. Weighing in at a highly drinkable 13.5% alcohol, this garnet red elixir is dense with roses and licorice, a hint of cassis, spice and a beefy center. Minerals haunt every sip of this blend of 50% grenache, 24% mourvedre, 22% syrah, and a bit of carignane and cinsault.
This cuvée‘s grapes hail from Gilroy and San Benito, as well as the mighty Bien Nacido vineyard down in Santa Maria. The Bonny Doon Vineyard flagship is a lovely creation, about as good as $30 gets and a sensational partner to that festive rack of lamb you’ve been planning. Best on Day Two, so open it now! Le Cigare Volant — life’s too short not to indulge.
A book of sensory adventure: The rituals, passions and discoveries of an engaged life.