February 22, 2011 new recipes

This evening we had two simple and very tasty dishes. From Epicurious.com, we had Penne with Broccoli and Mushrooms. This is a simple and very tasty, satisfying dish. It was easy to taste each ingredient. We also had a simple salad in three parts: diced avocado dressed with salt and hot smoked paprika, yellow cherry tomatoes with salt and pepper, and diced red bell peppers with Old Bay Seasoning. We just made this one up, and the seasonings really matched each vegetable.

The wine is from the Vineyard, one of our favorite local wine shops. Their Vineyard Central Coast Cabernet Sauvignon is bottled by Castoro Cellars. It is not one of those huge cabs--it was a nice counterpoint to the creamy vegetables and pasta we had--nice oak and plum flavors and aromas, smooth tannins in the finish.

February 19, 2011 new recipes

This was a fabulous dinner! I continue to be amazed by Mario Batali. I've really liked pretty much everything in Molto Italiano, which is the source of these 2 dishes. We started with Eggplant Bruschetta . Since we did not find Italian eggplant, we used 2 small regular eggplants, which worked just fine. We enjoyed that while we were making Duck Ragu. The original recipe was Garganelli with Duck Ragu. Rather than handmake the garganelli, we substituted penne. And this evening we used chicken legs instead of duck legs. We will certainly do this again with the duck!

The wine was a Santa Margherita 2006 Chianti Classico. This wine was a gift and if I could remember who gave ti to us I would be thanking you again!! It is a rich wine with the flavor and aroma of dark cherries, cocoa powder and oak, with gentle tannins. I am definitely going to look for this wine. It was a wonderful match to the food.

We finished dessert with homemade Profiterolles, which Anne showed Carl how to make. Time to go for a run!