Maharaja on Soquel
Open daily from 11:30 — generous and spice-laden lunch buffet @ $11.95. Terrific curries! The perfect antidote for turkey and mashed potatoes.
Wines for the Holidays
A vibrant creation from Muns Vineyard is this full-throated Pinot Noir 2011, loaded with black cherries and spice notes, strung along a 14.1% alc base like lights on a Christmas tree. Once open, this textbook Santa Cruz Mountains appellation pinot suggests loam and bay leaves, with salt and licorice on its long finish. A lovely wine—destined to seduce holiday entrees from roast pork to baked ham, and yes of course coho salmon and crab cakes—it is all about balance—tannins and plummy complexity held in delicious equipoise.
Native yeast fermentation—c.$40. Available just about everywhere. Salut!
White Wine for the Yuletide
Jon Morgan and the Bargetto boys have done it again. This time the must-have wine from Soquel Vineyards is a charismatic blend called Trinity Bianco. First off know that the wine is one of the many many bargains available right this minute at Shoppers Corner. In fact the 2012 Trinity Bianco is priced to move from here to kingdom come at a low, low $11.99. (I really missed my calling.)
But here’s the most important intel about this really lovely and highly versatile white.
It weighs in at a very accessible 13.8 % alcohol. Just about perfect in my book. The charm comes from an inspired blend of 76% chardonnay, 20% sauvignon blanc and 4% Gewurztraminer, for those floral topnotes. What it offers is a lovely tart nose that begins with a soft focus of violets and grapefruit and then unfolds into lime peel, geranium, and minerals followed by a soft wave of unctuous depths. Long legs and a light golden hue, this is a beauty just waiting to go with Dungeness crab, paella, ham, even alio e olio pastas.
We like it with kalamata olives and a few marcona almonds. Get a case while it lasts!
Local, Seasonal and Completely Unexpected
Lisa Jensen’s new book, Alias Hook, currently available online in its English edition—and soon to be available (May 14) through St. Martin’s Press—is a delicious reimagining of the world of Peter Pan. (I’m telling you this so that you can order the book in time for Christmas giving.)
Many of us know the delightful fairytale world of Peter Pan, thanks to the James Barrie classic about a band of enchanted lost boys led by the eternal boy, Peter. We fondly recall lovely Wendy who became their surrogate mother, their fantasy Neverland home, Peter’s sprightly sidekick Tinker Bell, and of course the archetypal pirate Captain Hook who lost his pocketwatch — and his hand — to a hungry crocodile.
Jensen has reimagined the children’s tale as a more (much more) adult saga, in which Captain James Hook is a cultured, introspective 18th century protagonist trapped in the magical and malevolent world of a vengeful Pan. Turning the tables on the childhood classic, Jensen tells her story from Hook’s point of view.
“Children find the Neverland in their dreams, their longing bores through the barrier between their world and this one, and in they tumble. My men too, return this way. For ages I deluded myself it must be possible to dream a way out.” Under the influence of Pan’s enchantment, Hook can neither die nor leave Neverland.
Mere dreaming has left Hook a prisoner of Neverland for centuries—when suddenly the plot thickens and a grown woman named Stella Parrish, manages to dream her way onto the Island (more…)
goes nicely with a fresh draft
A recent meeting with colleagues over at the West End Tap & Kitchen gave us an excuse to sample the house cheese board along with some indigenous IPA.
We made quick work of this, and a few other libations. In the wildly popular Ingalls St. complex, next to a long line of great micro wineries.
Sounds of the Season
Mystery and Wonder fills the UCSC Recital Hall this coming Saturday as the Concert Choir performs a cappella motets from the Renaissance to the 21st century. Included in this program of mystically-inflected music are avant garde 20th century chants and antiphonies from Henryk Gorecki, John Tavener and Arvo Paert. Monteverdi’s Baroque classic Magnificat Secondo, the neo-Romantic O Magnum Mysterium by Morten Lauridsen, and its Renaissance counterpart by Tomas Luis de Victoria are also on the program of haunting harmonies and unusual chromatics.
Conducted by Nathaniel Berman, performed by the UCSC Concert Choir. 7:30pm Sat. Dec. 7, Music Center Recital Hall. For info and tix.
Also this weekend, the Cabrillo Symphonic Chorus directed by Cheryl Anderson, will perform Bach’s Magnificat and other gorgeous music of the season, Friday and Sat, 9pm, and Sunday Dec. 8 at 4pm. @ Holy Cross Church.
Inside the Flame
A book of sensory adventure: The rituals, passions and discoveries of an engaged life.