Cooking With Wine

a heavy bottle of red wine

brought up from the cold basement

in a basket of white laundry

 William Carlos Williams

Welcome to the last Cooking With Wine. Studies have shown that people with the name Anonymous absolutely hated this series, while the rest of you just seemed to tolerate it. But that is ok. I enjoyed it and until and unless this jobby starts making us some serious money, the guiding principle around here will be if we enjoy it, we do it.

Mad Max's last selection is another from the Highway 12 portfolio, this time the 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon. This wine is 100% Cabernet, with a dark, intense color providing the foreshadowing for dark berries and soft French oak nuances. The silky mouthfeel gives way to aggressive tannins - this is a big, bold wine. Which is why, with final chill of winter in the air, it seemed the perfect time to make a hearty beef stew. The wine retails for around $20, and you can find it at Swirl, Sylvain, Theo's, Dick and Jenny's, and Elio's.

Oxtail and Beef Stew

Braising gives the occasional cook a margin of error wider than the headwaters of the Mississippi. For this beef stew, I like to use two cuts of beef- the gelatinous, sticky oxtails and what is commonly sold as beef stew meat. The oxtails allow a rich, lip smacking sauce to develop while the beef stew meat provides enough tender, shredded meat to go around the table. I like to use bacon grease as my lipid of choice, mostly because bacon is the new black this award season.

Preheat an oven to 300 degrees.

In a large dutch oven, heat enough oil or bacon fat to coat the entire pan in a quarter inch layer of lipid. Meanwhile, pat the oxtails and beef stew meat dry with a paper towel. The dryer you get the meat, the better the sear. The better the sear, the better the stew. Coat the meat with salt and sear in batches until well browned. Once browned remove from heat.

After browning all the meat, toss in an onion, two celery sticks, and two carrots, all coarsely chopped. Sweat for around eight minutes. Then add, a tablespoon of tomato paste. Let this color - you are looking for a dark rust color. Once the roots are rusted, add some salt and pepper, a bay leaf, and a few sprigs of thyme. Now add one whole bottle of decent red wine. Bring to just under a boil, return the meat to the pan, cover, and pop in the oven.

You want to cook this for about three hours or until the meat of the oxtails falls off the bone easily. It is better to overcook here (hardly possible) than undercook. Meanwhile, trim a two cups of green beans, cut them in half, and blanch in boiling, salted water. When done, plunge in ice water. Once cool, drain, and dry on paper towels. Now, peel and slice two carrots into half inch thick rounds and treat just like you did the green beans. Finally, slice some mushrooms of your choosing and saute on high heat in a well buttered pan. Once browned, add in some chopped garlic, salt, and pepper. Stir and remove from the heat.

I want you to remove the meat from the braising liquid. I realize this is sort of time intensive, but it is worth it. Then strain the braising liquid and reserve. (The leftover detritus of carrots, celery, onion, and shreds of meat is best with a sprinkle of chunky sea salt and eaten on crisp rounds of crusty bread or by the spoonful.)

Now, combine the meat with the strained sauce, the green beans, carrots, and mushrooms, and warm through. Taste. Adjust seasoning and serve in a big wide bowl. I topped mine with a gremolata - a fine dice- of preserved lemon, parsley, and garlic.

Cooking With Wine

Ahab had his white whale; I have brisket. Recently, I have become mildly obsessed with cooking the perfect brisket which is crusty and barked on the outside and juicy and tender on the inside. I am only in the beginning stages of this particular culinary obsession, but if you want to try some incredible brisket (as well as other bbq), make your way to Smokin Buddha BBQieux. Their brisket is fat and tender, with a spiced bark and rich interior. But more on the city's best barbecue later.

Mad Max sent forth a brawny and polished California Cab this week made by the folks at Five Vintners. Sourced from grapes from St. Helena, Rutherford, and Napa, this cab burst forth with red fruits and smooth tannins. Now, I could have easily grilled a fat porterhouse or thick lamb chops and knocked this pairing out of the park. But, brisket was on my mind. Specifically, a brisket that combined the benefits of braising with the glories of barbecue. Something that would not be too aggressive with the wine, but also stand up to the heavy onslaught or wine power that a California Cab brings to the table.

Marinated, uncooked brisket ready for the grill.

The Taste of Braising, the Texture of BBQ 

That is not an entirely accurate description, but let's go with it. What results in a juicy, lip smacking brisket with a deeper flavorprofile than traditional barbecued brisket while retaining more than a touch of smoke. To accomplish this, first get to marinating. Combine 3/4's of a bottle of stout red wine - Malbec will do- a glove of garlic smashed, a sprig of rosemary chopped, enough salt to fit in the palm of your hand, two bay leaves crushed, and ten or so cracks of black pepper. Mix all of this together, and pour over the brisket. Cover and marinate overnight. 

Get a smoker to hold steady at 225 degrees. I added a 3:2 mix of hickory and cherry wood chips, feel free to smoke with what the good lord gave you. Remove the brisket from the fridge and marinade; reserve the marinade. Pat dry and sprinkle some more coarse salt on top. Place in your smoker, cover and smoke at 225 for 3 hours. Meanwhile, reduce the marinade in a sauce pan until only about a quarter of it remains. 

After three hours, remove the brisket, place on a sheet of foil, pour over the reduced marinade, seal the foil, and place back on the smoker for another three hours or so. After three hours, remove from foil, place back on the smoker unencumbered for thirty minutes or so. Then slice across the grain. 

Last time I made this the Saints dominated the Lions in a playoff matchup. If everyone makes this brisket, no doubt the Saints are going to the win. Throw in the wine, and most likely we are hosting an NFC Championship game next Sunday. The 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon from Five Vintners is available at Iris, Commander's Palace, Mr. B's, Houston's, Whole Foods, and The Wine Seller, where it retails for around $37.

Cooking With Wine

The wines made by Abe Schoener are unique, to put it mildly. His Scholium Project crafts wines which often bear no relation to any wine you have ever had. Take for instance, his wine called the Prince in His Caves, which is a sauvignon blanc aged in old red wine barrels. The wine is bottled unfiltered and with a mild orange hue,  it looks more like a wheat beer and tastes like biting into a grapefruit. It is perhaps the strangest, and most memorable wine, I've ever tasted. So when Mad Max's box o' wine revealed the 2009 Naucratis, let's just say a straightforward dish would not due. This wine is made from 100% Verdelho, a varietal more common in Portugal and used almost exclusively for Madeira. The wine is lush, almost oily in the mouth with crisp acidity.

So with those flavors in mind, we wanted to do something that would be able to stand up to the heft of the wine while benefiting from its palate cleansing acidity. What resulted was a leftover meal fit for a king. I must confess though most of the heavy lifting was borne by Lindsay. Should be no surprise then, that this was our favorite wine and food pairing so far.

Mexican Chicken Pot Pie

The night before, Lindsay made chicken enchiladas based on a recipe pulled from one of her television boyfriends, Tyler Florence. The recipe left us with a large pot of black beans and chicken in a tomatillo veloute. So we took a logical step and combined a cup of the beans with the remaining chicken veloute. We tucked it into ramekins and topped it with sheets of puff pastry. Then bake it at 350 degrees until the top is brown and crusty.

Chicken Pot Pie is often boring and bland. This one was anything but. Robust, spicy, with deep flavors and varying textures. Plus, anytime you can add puff pastry to leftovers, you create a dish much greater than the sum of its parts. Which sort of reminds me of Schoener's wines. You can find the 2009 Naucratis at August, Rue 127, Loa, Delachaise, Rambla, Wino, Dick and Jenny's, and Cafe Amelie. It retails for just under $20.

Cooking With Wine

In the last few years, Brussels sprouts have emerged as one of the favorite vegetables in our house. Sometimes we roast them with bacon, garlic, and salt, other times we blanch them before slicing them in half and slowly caramelizing in brown butter and finishing it with shallot and lemon. For the last few weeks, Lindsay has been raving about the shaved Brussels sprouts salad at Sylvain and asking me to make something like that.

When Mad Max dropped off a substantial white wine with notes of lemon, green apple, citrus, and grapefruit my mind immediately went to trying a version of shaved Brussels sprout salad. The 2009 Ribolla Adriatico from Bastianich Wines has a firm minerality and a lot of acid, with just a touch of sweetness at the end. That made me want to incorporate some spice and sesame oil to take the dish in an Asian direction. You can find the wine on the list at Green Goddess, Bacchanal, and Whole Foods, where it retails for under $20.

Shaved Brussels Sprouts Slaw with Poached Chicken

The chicken is optional. But if you want to add it, it works best in salads when poached. Bring 6 cups of water up to a simmer, add some cloves, salt, bay leaf, and a half cup of white wine. Add the chicken and simmer for 25 minutes or so.

A mandoline is one way to slice the sprouts into thin rounds. But be careful and it helps to listen to this song while doing it. A food processor with a slicing blade is a much better option. Once your sprouts are shaved, place them in a deep bowl. Thinly slice the radicchio and add this to the Brussels sprouts. Toast about a palmful of slivered almonds until light brown. Add this to the above, along with salt and pepper.

Finely dice the green chili and some garlic (if you have ginger, by all means use it). Place this in a second bowl. To this add some soy sauce, the juice of one lemon, a tablespoon of rice wine vinegar, and a teaspoon of honey (you need the sweetness to counteract the bitterness of the raw radicchio and Brussels sprouts). Whisk. While whisking stream in a about tablespoon of sesame oil, then finish the dressing with olive oil. Taste. Adjust seasoning.

Pour dressing over the Brussels sprouts and radicchio top with poached chicken and mix to combine. Let sit for a few minutes before diving in. Chopsticks or forks are acceptable.

Cooking With Wine

Sometimes a meal just comes together without a plan. When this happens the result is not at all unlike giving a speech. There is the meal you wanted to make, the meal you made, and the meal you should have made. What I intended to make was a pork roast that sat atop firm stewed lentils. What ended up on the plate was a stew of lentils which had thickened the braising liquid by bursting forth from their shells. What I should have done is cook the two separately.

The wine was partially to blame or credit depending on your point of view. Mad Max's offering that week was winemaker Brian Graham's 2009 Parlay "Bookmaker" blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Petite Syrah, Syrah, and Petite Verdot, which kept changing in the glass. There was jammy red fruit, and black pepper, calling to mind that incredible Italian dessert of ripe strawberries with balsamic and black pepper. Sharp and firm tannins led to a quick, pleasing finish. This great everyday red wine retails for about $20 and you can find it at Mondo, Whole Foods, Le Foret, Ste. Marie, Cork & Bottle, and Stanley.

Roast Pork Loin with Lentil Stew

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

A two pound pork loin (not tenderloin) benefits from a brine. If pressed for time, just season with salt for an hour or so before cooking. Rinse off brine and dry thoroughly. Season with salt, pepper, and smoked paprika. Sear in olive oil in a dutch oven until brown and crusty on all sides. Remove. Into the pot, add an onion and three carrots roughly chopped. Saute on medium heat for about 10 minutes until softened.

 Add in a cup of lentils and a few cloves of garlic. I had red ones which turned a muted orange once cooked. Then 4 cups of water. Add back in the pork roast, bring to a boil and, place in oven, uncovered until pork is cooked through and the lentils have absorbed most of the liquid. Remove pork, allow it to rest for 10 minutes, slice and cube. Taste stew, adjust seasoning - a little cumin at this point is a great idea, a dash of vinegar also. Ladle lentil stew into a shallow bowl, top with diced pork, and leaves of parsley.

Cooking with Wine

Today's episode is brought to you by the Texas Board of Tourism. In case you haven't heard, Texas and its various boards, commissions, cowboys, and people who love big hair paid a whole 10 gallon hat of money to have Top Chef film in its various locales. Now, me personally, I don't see anything wrong with that. What I can't understand is why they didn't pay any money to keep Most Eligible Dallas from airing. Such a boneheaded decision really has me question their supposed supremacy in things like "living" or "modern cities" or "producing good football teams".

Chili is revered by Texans like Ted Hall who once threatened to kill me if I ever included beans in a bowl of Texas Red. Pinto beans always make me think of some stagecoach cook shutting up a guy named Slim with a scoop from a dutch oven. Couple this with bottle of zinfandel from Mad Max that had me thinking of something spicy and tomato strewn and the stage was set to make a chili that would send a Texan running to the Alamo. I used torn, dried chiles to bring not just heat, but a fragrant fruitiness to the party. Some kale chips (wash, dry, olive oil, salt 300 degree oven for 20 minutes) were the crowning jewel on a mockery fiercer than any Tony Romo joke.

All of this got along very well with the 2009 Saldo Zinfandel released by Orin-Swift wines made under the stewardship of owner/winemaker Dave Phinney. Zinfandel is a wine that wants something robust and brash, and making fun of Texas sure is. The wine retails for around $28 and you can find it at Sylvain, Whole Foods, Iris, Commander's Palace, K-Paul's, Wine Seller, and Maximos.

Messed With Texas Red

Soak 1 pound of pinto beans overnight or while at work. In a Dutch oven, saute over medium heat one whole onion diced with two or three jalapenos diced fine. While that melts, de-stem and de-seed one dried ancho chili and cut into roughly one inch squares. Add these to the pot, and cook for a minute or so. The heat will soften them. Now add in a tablespoon of chopped garlic along with a teaspoon of cumin, a hearty pinch of oregano, and a teaspoon of chili powder. Stir so the spices can absorb some of the oil.

After a minute or so, add a tablespoon of tomato paste. Stir. Let cook for about 2 minutes (doing so deepens the flavor). Deglaze with half a bottle of beer and a 1/4 cup of apple cider vinegar. Once the beer has mostly evaporated, add in a 28 ounce can of whole tomatoes and their juice. Using the back of a spoon mash the tomatoes. Drain beans from soaking water and add to the pot along with a quart of water. Bring to a boil, lower to a simmer and cook uncovered until beans are tender and the sauce is thick..

Crown with queso blanco, parsley, the kale chips, and a dig at Mack Brown's coaching prowess. 

Cooking With Wine

The term Indian Summer is thrown around a lot right now. Near as I can tell it is the last few days of September when the days feel like summer and the nights fall. Well here in New Orleans, it is still just hot, but there are rumors of fall in the air. Sunday afternoon was one of those perfect Indian Summer days and it was time to grill. But this time in lieu of beef, pork, or chicken, we opted to grill shrimp.

Mad Max had provided the perfect wine for grilled shrimp. As the man himself says,"The 2008 Pinot Blanc from cult winemaker, Robert Foley, is vinified with total focus on the fruit characteristics of the Pinot Blanc grape - effusive peach and gardenia blossom notes in the bouquet, a broad and fresh mouth feel with a lingering fruity finish. The wine was vinified entirely in stainless steel to preserve the freshness of fruit, no oak barrels, no malolactic fermentation." You can find it at Carte des Vins, Rib Room, Stella!, Herbsaint, NOLA, and Coquette. This wine retails for around $25 and is best drank out of a mason jar to complete the summertime ensemble.

Good enough for good times I say. The recipe we used came out of Mario Batali's excellent Italian Grill cookbook. It is really more of a technique than a recipe as he uses it throughout the book to add a crunchy, charred crust to proteins. As you will see below, a bread crumb sort of pesto kicks ass on the grill. Batali also calls for a piastra- a  flat metal sheet over a roaring fire- in this recipe. Not having one and channeling inner MacGyver, I just flipped over a cast iron skillet and used its flat underside.

Shrimp Spiedini alla Romagnola

First combine 1 bunch of Italian parsley, 1 bunch basil, 2 cups fresh bread crumbs, a hefty pinch of salt, black pepper, and 1/4 cup of olive oil. I added a little bit of lemon zest because yellow and green look good together. You blend all of that into a paste in a food processor, blender, or mortar and pestle, if you aren't into that whole brevity thing. Toss two pounds of peeled and deveined shrimp into this paste and coat well.

Now thread the shrimp onto some rosemary sprigs that you have removed the leaves from and soaked in water. Or you could use bamboo skewers. Or if you are afraid of pokey things, just place them directly on grill. After skewering all the shrimp, leave in the fridge for about 30 minutes while you get your fire cranking.

 Take a cast iron pan (or piastra if you fancy), flip it over and place it over the hottest part of the grill. Let it get hot, brush on some olive oil, and then place the skewers on the makeshift piastra. Cook 2 minutes per side. Serve with a salad- here I did a grilled Caesar. The shrimp come out the perfect love child between grilled shrimp and fried shrimp, with little clumps of charred bread and a zip of "pesto". It is the perfect dish for an Indian Summer's Eve....Wait, that didn't come out right.

Cooking With Wine

As soon as my grubby little paw grabbed the bottle of Curveball Spinning White Mad Max had stashed into his box of treats, I knew precisely what dish I wanted to make: Spaghetti Carbonara. Carbonara is one of the world's most perfect dishes, combining eggs, pork, cheese, pepper, and starch into an elegant sauce. Fact: carbonara is the only pasta dish in the world which can double as breakfast.

The composition of the Spinning White is an interesting one. At 85% Sauvignon Blanc and 15% Gewurztraminer there is a nice acidic kick but also this white plays very nicely with spicy foods. This wine is also made by Paul Hoffman. You can find it for under $20 at Cork & Bottle, Mondo, and Rum House.

A fattier chardonnay might be many peoples first choice with a dish like carbonara. I prefer something that can handle spice a bit better, which this wine can. The reason is that black pepper can lose a lot of its spicy and aromatic characters when you cook it above a certain temperature or cook it for long periods of time. With carbonara, you aren't doing much more than warming than pepper, so be prepared for a simple battery to your sinuses, if you make it correctly.

Note: The beauty of carbonara lies in its simplicity. Do not try to muck this up with North African Wild Hyssop or Guatemalan Coffee reductions. And if you do, please don't write in about it.

Spaghetti Carbonara

Like roast chicken, I almost never make carbonara the same way twice. One time I might use fettucine, another time one egg and one extra yolk, the third time I mix the bacon into the sauce first, etc... But always, the same 5 ingredients: pasta, eggs, cheese, pork, and black pepper. Normally, I substitute bacon and Parmesan for the traditional guanciale and Pecorino Romano and you can too.

Cut bacon strips into quarter inch rectangles. Fry until crisp then place on a paper napkin lined plate to drain. One package spaghetti, boil in heavily salted water. As you can see, you do not need a doctorate in culinary arts for this dish.

While, pasta is boiling crack an egg into a deep bowl. Grate roughly a half cup of Parmesan over the egg. Whisk. Now take a pepper mill and crank it twenty times. Whisk again. Few more cranks and you should be ready to go.

Once cooked, drain the pasta but reserve a smidge of the starchy, salted water. Add the pasta and the water into the bowl and mix rapidly. The warm pasta will melt the cheese, warm the eggs, and awaken the pepper, essentially playing the role of the Uniter. Once combined, mount on plates and top with bacon, more cheese, and a crack or two of pepper.

Cooking with Wine

It is too damn hot to cook. The heat index is currently hovering around temperatures usually reserved for spacecraft reentry and foundries where a young Irish kid looking to walk on to the football team at Notre Dame works while going to community college.  In short, I don't want to cook. I don't want to turn on the oven or the stove. If I could subsist solely on snowballs and cold beer I would.

But this article beckons, which is why this week the title should read Not Cooking with Wine. This week, Mad Max sent over a 2009 Highway 12 Carneros Chardonnay made by Michael Sebastiani. The accompanying notes say, "This '09 Nueva is every bit what you've come to love about the modern style lush Chardonnay, with a touch more minerality. The balanced acidity makes it fresh and crisp, while letting the buttery finish shine complete with a new Stelvin closure."

What I took out of that description was acidity, crisp, fresh, and butter and that Stelvin sounds like the last name/nickname of your roommate in college. That triggered a craving for a version of the Wedge salad made with heirloom tomatoes, romaine, and homemade blue cheese dressing. Bacon would have made the salad complete, but that would have required cooking. Still, it was one of the best things I've never cooked in my kitchen.

Blue Cheese, Tomatoes, and Romaine

Hold stalks of romaine horizontal in front of you. Cut it across the rib in one inch sections. Wash, dry, and pop in the freezer for a spell.

For the tomatoes, this time of year places like Whole Foods and the like start stocking this multi-colored orbs of tomato goodness. They have exotic names like Brandywine, Green Zebra, and Bob Marley Spliff. Ok, I made that last one up, Caddyshack fans. Pick out a few, that are soft and ready to burst. Take them home, core them, then slice into fat rounds (along lines of latitude, not longitude). Season with salt and pepper.

Dressing couldn't be simpler. Your silver ware set has two sizes of spoons, right? You know the larger one? Use that as measuring stick. Take one heaping spoon of sour cream and blend it with three heaps of mayo. To this add about 12 cranks of black pepper, a tablespoon of white wine vinegar, a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce, and a pinch of salt. Stir to combine. Now break in a wedge of blue cheese roughly equivalent in size to the door stopper at your elementary school. I like the dressing to be chunky. Stir and let the flavors come together for about an hour.

Place slices of tomato on a plate, top with blue cheese. Toss romaine in a touch of olive oil, then stack on plate and top with more blue cheese. More cracked black pepper is always welcome.

Cooking with Wine

Can't stop cooking pork. Won't stop cooking pork. This week's mashup with Mad Max paired simple smoked ribs with the knockout good 2009 Headbanger Zinfandel made by Paul Hoffman. Hoffman, that guy above standing next to the con artist formerly known as Bloggle, makes a variety of wines that are approachable, affordable quaffers. This deep, dark, and delicious zin has lots of juicy acidity. Aromas of fresh baked berry pie, rose petals, and cinnamon give way to cherry cola, cedar, and cocoa.  It sells for under $20 (a steal since you asked me) and you can find it at Mondo, Brigtsen's, Ruffino, Theo's, and Whole Foods.

Zinfandel naturally sets off an alarm for pasta all' Amatriciana. That rich, smoky, bacony, spicy sauce that is marinara's hotter cousin that you got to second base with on that one summer night. Or at least that you told your friends you did. But we are trying to cut back on carbs on the home front so the next most logical thing was barbecue ribs. Not only did it work, it did what wine and food pairings are supposed to do, namely compliment each other. The spice and smoke from the ribs was matched by the heft and acidity of the wine. Coincidentally, in that photo Hoffman is holding a bottle of said wine. #1 wine related commentator Meghan ought to be stoked.

Headbanging Baby Back Ribs

1 Rack of Baby Back Ribs
Rub of your choice but the one I make has lots of spicy, smoked Hungarian paprika, dried lemon peel, salt, brown sugar, oregano, cayenne, garlic and onion powder.
Smoke
Time

Remove the insane in the membrane from the back of the baby backs. Sprinkle rub liberally over both sides of ribs and massage it into the meat. Let sit at room temperature for an hour or so. Meanwhile get a smoker or charcoal grill ready. I like to smoke at 250 degrees for about two hours. You can use whatever wood you like, but I find pecan to be the proverbial bomb, as the kids used to say.

After two hours, place rack on foil, douse with apple juice or even apple cider vinegar, and wrap in foil. Back on the grill for another hour. If you have some of that bbq sauce from last week's rambling post, use it. But you won't need much.

Cooking With Wine

My favorite eating season is always the next one. In fall, all I can think of is icy, cold nights with big bowls of wine braised beef, platters of raw oysters, and gumbos studded with andouille. In the dead of winter, I crave green fava beans tossed in mint, chili, and salty cheese sitting alongside crusty lamb chops. Springtime brings on urges to grill corn and toss it with plump Creole tomatoes, slivers of jalapeno, shallot, and lime juice to go with crusty skirt steaks coated in garlic. And now that summer is here, naturally all I want to eat is bowls of crimson colored chili, cornbread, and platters of pork.

Which is how I found myself roasting a pork tenderloin coated in rosemary, garlic, and lemon zest on what was an otherwise scorching summer day. Also, into the oven went a fluffy, filling spoonbread straight out the Frank Stitt playbook. Wishful thinking, I guess.

Of course, Mad Max's selection made this brief journey to fall even more enjoyable. Bob Foley has been handcrafting wines in Napa long enough to be able to do whatever he wants. In his 2008 "The Griffin" he combines a few traditional California grapes, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, with some less well known varietals, Petite Syrah and Charbono. The result is a wine with fruity berries and well-rounded spice which retails for $29.99. You can find it at August, NOLA, Le Meritage, Delechaise, Bouche, Martin's Wine Cellar, Acquistapace, Wine Country Bistro, and Calandro's. Note: the next morning, I was reminded it is still summer with the red wine foggies.

Roasted Pork Loin and Spoonbread

In a mortar and pestle, food processor, or blender combine, 3 cloves of garlic, a good three fingers pinch of fresh rosemary, a pinch of dried oregano, 3 pinches salt, the zest of one lemon, and peppercorns. Drizzle in a quarter cup of olive oil and blend until smooth. Rub this all over your pork loin and let it sit for about an hour or more. You can tie it up or not.

Heat a cast iron skillet to just smoking and then sear the loin on all sides. Then place in a 350 degree oven until cooked to your desired doneness. I like my pork to be blushing like Bloggle at a red head convention. Allow meat to rest, the slice into quarter inch medallions. There should be some good juices in the pan. Adding say a touch of coarse mustard and some stock would be a good idea. Pour that jus on top.

For the spoonbread. Buy this cookbook. Seriously don't make me tell you again. You need to own that cookbook.

Here is to the quick arrival of fall, football, and the longing for winter.

Cooking With Wine

A bottle of rose has done more good to cure the effects of summertime heat than any other invention, short of air conditioning. Not only is rose a great internal a/c, but it gets along exceedingly well with traditional New Orleans foods. In fact, I'll wager that pound for pound, rose, but specifically rose champagne, is the number one match for a wide variety of New Orleans foods, generally.

Mad Max's latest offering is a pink wine from the affordable line of Bastianich Wines. The 2010 Rosato is made up of 100% Refosco, which is a red wine grape which traditionally makes for a very spicy wine. Here, the flavor is softer and more apt to stand up to the hot sun of an early summer evening. This Italian version of rose, had me wishing for a plate of antipasti and a view of the water. What came out of that was what I'd consider an Italian's take on Chicken Paillard. You can find the wine at Galatoire's, Swirl, Bacchanal, and Cork & Bottle where it retails for around $14 a bottle.

Chicken Paillard-Italian Style

Begin with a chicken breast per person. Pound it out until it is half an inch thick. Season both sides with salt and pepper. Meanwhile, slice a red onion or shallot into half moons and toss with the juice of one lemon, the zest of said lemon, and a 1/4 cup of olive oil. Pour this over the chicken breasts, toss to coat, and let it sit while you make the relish. 

Traditionally, chicken paillard is topped with romaine, a few shreds of Parmesan, thin sliced shallots, and maybe a tomato or two. What I wanted to do with this dish, is bring in the classic Italian antipasti flavors in a "topping" form.

Begin with a good selection of olives- I like the dry, wrinkly black ones, big meaty green ones, and some Kalamata. Pit each olive. To this add some thin sliced red onion, thin slices of pickled, Italian hot peppers, some oregano, and a big, plump tomato coarsely chopped. A splash of red wine vinegar will help bring it all together. 

Grill your chicken over a medium heat. Six minutes per side should be sufficient. Top with the relish mixture, a few slivers of salty, Italian cheese (I had Pecorino in the house), and a few leaves of basil. Simply perfect, the food and wine give air conditioning a run for its money. 

Cooking With Wine

We live in a nation of laws, rules, dicta, and things you are supposed to do. Most of them, should not be followed. But one thing you should never turn down is an opportunity to sample wines and give your ideas and opinions on them. Which is why you find yourself reading something different on this Wednesday. So from now on every other week, in lieu of Winesday, we will look at wines through the lens of cooking at home. 

I often find myself shopping for wines and using the expression, "Give me a nice Tuesday night wine." The wine should be something interesting that won't break the bank, that I can open while I cook, enjoy it while we eat, and finish it on the couch. Welcome to Cooking With Wine.

Mad Max is supplying us with some wines and his first offering is a 2009 Pinot Grigio from TuTu. The winemaker is Rob Lawson who strives to produce a bright clean Pinot Grigio loaded with ripe stone fruit flavors, think apricot and nectarine, not strawberries following the Grateful Dead in a VW bus. You can find it at Houstons, Red Fish Grill, W.I.N.O., Calandro's in Baton Rouge, Cork & Bottle, and Royal Palm.

Pinot Grigio is a wine I always associate with Italian fare, but seeing as how this wine is made in Caliifornia, I thought about doing some cross-cultural cooking with a touch of farm freshness (California) and something spicy (Italian). When I tasted the wine, it had some weight in the finish, meaning it tended to stick around, which made it fodder for something substantial. Here is the result.

Grilled Italian Sausages and Creole Tomato Salad

Grill sausages. Don't overcook them. See that was simple.

It is likely either you or someone you know has a heap of basil that is threatening to take over their yard. What I want you to do is take about 2 big handfuls of basil and blanch them in soft salted water for about thirty seconds. Then drop it into an ice bath. Once cold, drain and squeeze all the water out of it. You should have a ball of green cold leaves. Cut about half of them into a blender. Pour in a cup of olive oil and blend for a minute. After a minute, cut the rest of the leaves into the blender and blend for about two minutes more. Let this mixture "steep" overnight then strain thru a coffee filter set over a fine mesh strainer. This will take a while, so go read War and Peace.

Slice creole tomatoes, season with salt and pepper, drizzle on basil oil, and top with lumps of soft goat cheese. With the fattiness and spice of the Italian sausages, and the juiciness and sweetness of the tomatoes, the acidity and mineral of this Pinot Grigio perfectly cleaned the palate, without getting in the way. Mad Max says he likes it with fresh summer pastas, spicy Asian cuisine, crisp salads, or just to avoid your in-laws while you twirl in bliss.