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TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

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TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Bill Spohn » Tue Aug 02, 2022 5:12 pm

I had been doing an annual terrine event for 16 years when Covid hit, resulting in a two year hiatus (2020/2021). Finally, after waiting two years, things had resolved enough for me to hold the 17th event a couple of years late.

I originally came up with the idea of featuring both culinary imagination and food and wine matching and interaction, in a form where almost all of the work took place days earlier and people could just show up with their dish and wines and we could all spend a relaxed afternoon pondering what went best with which wine, did we like a given terrine, could we have improved it in any way, and other such issues of great import and enjoyment. I was so keen to reconvene the event that I enthusiastically invited just about everyone that had ever taken part in previous events, and every single one of them promptly accepted, no doubt raring to go just like I was.

I will give my notes along with a picture of the dish and wines as presented.

Sole Timbales with Scallop Mousseline. – an inspired start, light, tasty and served with suitable wines.

1.jpg


2021 Dom. de la Pepiere Muscadet de Sèvre-et-Maine sur lie – clean wine with very slightly sweet apple fruit in the nose and on palate.

Lilbert-Fils Champagne Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs Cramant (nv) – good mousse, a slightly funky nose that I liked with the food, finished clean and crisp. Mostly made from 2016 fruit. This wine won a narrow blue ribbon for best with food from me.


Pate de Girolles avec Foi Gras, pickled grapes and radishes, shallot marmalade and Sumac pita crisps My dish, made with a pork and chicken liver forcemeat with added sautéed chanterelles and finely diced dried apricots macerated overnight in brandy, all of which was added to the dish the next morning after they had plumped. I spiced it with quatre epices and fresh thyme and made it three days ahead so the flavours could mature.

2.jpg


Served with a variety of accompaniments – pita crisp painted with olive oil sprinkled with sumac and fresh thyme and lightly baked, a shallot jam (not sweet other than what was in the shallots), mandolined radishes pickled in apple cider vinegar, pickling spices, maple syrup and a Serrano pepper, made ahead a few days – the Serrano gave a nice but not obtrusive kick, and finally red grapes pickled using cider vinegar, fresh ginger, star anise, coriander cinnamon and bay leaf.

2018 Ch. Suduiraut Le Blanc Sec de Suduiraut - my theory was that wines with slight sweet hints might match better with the dish, and this dry wine from a sauternes house fit the description. A dry wine but with sweet hints and good balance, showing hints of melon and some citrus with good length.

2016 Foreau Domaine du Clos Naudin Vouvray Demi-Sec – more apricot in this nose but it changed to sweet pear with time. Clean long finish and this was my fave for food matching.



Lobster Thermidor Terrine, Beluga lentils and miniature caesar salad – tremendous effort and imagination went into this dish and it really paid off – pictured twice, before and after slicing.

3a.jpg


3b.jpg


2021 Idlewild Flora and Fauna Rose – quite dark colour for a Rose – a reddish gold, and made from Italian varietals. It was a clean and surprisingly dry wine given the sweetness in the nose. Very good ad looked like a good bet for best wine of the pair – until I tasted the next wine.

2020 Guigal Condrieu ‘La Doriane’ – adorned with a slightly garish gold foil label, this was a superb white Rhone. Lime and spice in the nose and a very rich mouth feel, with a very good medium dry finish. Loved this one and would like to see where it goes with some time.


Ham with Three Fruits Terrine – two thin slices of terrine served with sliced cucumber and blueberries

4.jpg


2017 El Enemigo Chardonnay – medium colour, nice somewhat oaky nose smooth balanced chard. Good. This Argentine Chard rarely disappoints.

1997 Mastroberardino Taurasi Radici Riserva – still quite a dark wine, with some orange at the edges, showing a nose of dark fruit (cherries) with leather and maybe even a hint of forest floor. Best wine with the food but it was close.


Prosciutto-wrapped Chicken, Leek and Mushroom Terrine (oyster, morel, hen of the woods)

5.jpg


2016 Louis Jadot Volnay Clos des Chenes – these two wines were served blind in hopes that some of us might prefer the Gamay to the Pinot. Deeper nise, with colour. Flavour and intensity all ramped up a tad from the bojo. Very good and my fave.

2018 Domaine A.-F. Gros Moulin -A-Vent en Mortperay – lighter fruit in the nose but juicy/sappy, mild fruit on palate and medium length. Good wine but outmatched here.


Roasted chicken terrine – roasted layered chicken with good texture and subtlety.

6.jpg


2010 Travaglini Gattinara – looked older than it is with orange hints and the nose was high toned and warm. If you have had this wine you will remember that odd bottle!

2010 Matteo Correggia Roero Riserva Roche d'Ampsej – a dark colour and nose of lovely pure fruit and recognizable Nebbiolo origin. Big wine but in a good place now. Classy and would show well in a Barolo tasting. Excellent and my choice.


Fruit Dessert Terrine, Zabaglione Cream

7.jpg


2021 Ruffino Moscato D’Asti – light, pleasant enough but wouldn’t get in the way of conversation

2020 Santa Vittoria Moscato D’Asti – an altogether more serious wine (if that isn’t a contradiction in terms regarding Moscato d’Asti). Better flavour intensity, acidity depth. The clear choice.

All were looking forward to next year's event!
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Bob Parsons Alberta » Tue Aug 02, 2022 8:28 pm

Classic event as usual, my mouth waters whilst reading this post :D
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Jenise » Tue Aug 02, 2022 8:41 pm

So much fun!!!! I'll follow with my notes tomorrow. Sorry not to leave you with any leftovers, but I had to save the last four inches to share with my brother who remembers the lobster thermidor and caesar salad at a certain Los Angeles area restaurant as fondly as I do. Thank you again for hosting.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by David M. Bueker » Tue Aug 02, 2022 8:45 pm

Return of the terrines!
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Bill Spohn » Wed Aug 03, 2022 11:57 am

So jenise - I forgot to ask, did you buy that 'pan' just for this or is it a regular implement in your kitchen? It looks interesting. I figured that you just repurposed a Baguette pan but I forgot to ask.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Bill Spohn » Wed Aug 03, 2022 12:05 pm

David M. Bueker wrote:Return of the terrines!


It took us awhile, David but apparently all the participants had been using all their spare time for the last couple of years to come up with terrine ideas they wanted to try out.

I forgot to ask Jenise if Bob was tired of eating nothing but trial terrine versions for the last couple of weeks!

We finished the last remnant of mine last night and I used the foie gras fat that had seeped out of the terrine to saute a couple of eggs this morning - yum!
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Jenise » Wed Aug 03, 2022 12:52 pm

Bill Spohn wrote:So jenise - I forgot to ask, did you buy that 'pan' just for this or is it a regular implement in your kitchen? It looks interesting. I figured that you just repurposed a Baguette pan but I forgot to ask.


No I bought it. I have a similar mould that's a bit shallower and shorter, which I love. But for the number of servings (plus trimming, potentially) required this year, I needed a bit more length. The place to buy stuff like this is JB Prince, in New York. It's a candy store of moulds and specialty chef tools. This mould turned out to be wider and deeper than actually specified in the catalog, which at first dismayed me consider how much more filling would be required to fill it but it turned out to be a bonus because it gave me the extra space to be creative. That is, making three layers where I'd initially imagined (and made in trials #1 thru 3) just one: 1) the mushroom border on top, 2) a clear fino-laced aspic that would showcase the 2.8 lbs of raw lobster meat used in the filling, and the final cream/amontillado/pureed shiitake layer.
My wine shopping and I have never had a problem. Just a perpetual race between the bankruptcy court and Hell.--Rogov
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Dale Williams » Wed Aug 03, 2022 1:00 pm

Wow, all look great, and some nice wines too (Pepiere &Lilbert are a fun way to start).
Jenise, "2.8 lbs of raw lobster meat?" Raw or parcooked? I've never tried to remove raw meat.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Jenise » Wed Aug 03, 2022 1:22 pm

Dale Williams wrote:Wow, all look great, and some nice wines too (Pepiere &Lilbert are a fun way to start).
Jenise, "2.8 lbs of raw lobster meat?" Raw or parcooked? I've never tried to remove raw meat.


Yes, six large tails. Meat's very easy to remove, just cut down the middle top and bottom. I weighed them raw after removing the shells--it was a very impressive pile. The meat went into the terrine cooked, though, lightly broiled then cut into large bite sized pieces. It took all but one half of one tail to fill the mould. The shells were then pounded and turned into a stock with fino sherry then drained, clarified, reduced, and gelatinized. A wee bit went into the cream layer and the rest entombed the lobster--really close, I had less than 1/3 cup of stock leftover. I was really sweating that as I had no recipe by which to gauge the volumetrics, this was all guesswork.

I called the dish "Dinner at the Dal Rae". I was reaching into my childhood here. Lobster thermidor was a favorite special occasion meal at our favorite white-tablecloth 'Continental' black-leather-booths-Mad-Men kind of place when I was a kid, where all meals started with a cocktail and next a tableside caesar salad. My dad was a business customer with an unlimited expense account who also frequently brought family there. Those are the flavors I was trying to put on the plate.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Jenise » Wed Aug 03, 2022 1:57 pm

Bill, fun to look back on 17 years of these. Bob and I, who were there for the first one and every one since, debated about whether it should be called the 19th, wherein 17 and 18 were cancelled. Since the first was in 2004, we leaned toward 19th to make the math work. Not that you have to....

About the wines, on which I'm surprised to say we differ quite a bit:

2021 Dom. de la Pepiere Muscadet de Sèvre-et-Maine sur lie – Minerally and wonderful. A great match with the dish but my favorite because:

Lilbert-Fils Champagne Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs Cramant (nv) – What you called funky others called sweaty and I called flawed. The first sip was good but the sweat turned into boiled onion skins as it sat in the glass. Bob A confirmed that this bottle lacked the fruit others had shown; I'm pretty certain this had a mercaptan issue.
***
2018 Ch. Suduiraut Le Blanc Sec de Suduiraut - quite dry, especially when compared to the Vouvray and though initially my favorite with your terrine, it didn't highlight the fruit element in your dish which the Vouvray did, and I eventually switched camps.

2016 Foreau Domaine du Clos Naudin Vouvray Demi-Sec – What you said.
***
2021 Idlewild Flora and Fauna Rose – quite dark colour for a Rose – your description is spot-on. You asked me before I served them which I thought would be best with the terrine. I predicted that I would like this match for the sherry and shellfish elements in my terrine, but that the Condrieu would be a major distraction. The actuality only confirmed both. This was the food match, but for just sipping? The Condrieu.

2020 Guigal Condrieu ‘La Doriane’ – though I generally despise viognier, this wine has always turned my head and of the many different vintages I've had, this one is one of the best. It nails the concentration but where some have been a bit overripe and cloying, this vintage has the acidity and structure to carry the weight. Definitely, of the two wines, the one I wanted to go sit in a corner with another glass of.
***
2017 El Enemigo Chardonnay – what you said, and my favorite with David's terrine for the way it emphasized the fruit components which were more upfront than the fruit in your terrine.

1997 Mastroberardino Taurasi Radici Riserva – I enjoyed this very much, but for me the mature notes needed the gentle flavors of braised meats or a tomato sauce.
***
2016 Louis Jadot Volnay Clos des Chenes – This was a very tough choice. Both wines were excellent, in and of themselves and with the terrine. So you had a burgundy, and burgundy-producer's gamay. We had an initial vote of who thinks which wine is the burgundy, and the gamay got at least as many votes.

2018 Domaine A.-F. Gros Moulin -A-Vent en Mortperay – effusive nose fooled a lot of us into thinking this was the Volnay. I liked the wines equally. And I was especially impressed, considering how much I've not liked every other '18 Bojo I've had, that this wine is from that vintage. Definitely not overripe; perhaps I shouldn't be so dismissive.
***
2010 Travaglini Gattinara – on this course it was as hard to choose which wine worked best as it had been with the previous course. Both were excellent, both paired well. However, the warm nose on this wine had me hooked from the getgo, and so I just ever so slightly preferred it to the Roche.

2010 Matteo Correggia Roero Riserva Roche d'Ampsej – as you said: "a dark colour and nose of lovely pure fruit and recognizable Nebbiolo origin. Big, classy...."
***
Your descriptions of these are spot-on. That Santa Vittoria was a game changer and the voting was, for once, unanimous. I would seek that one out. Wonder what the price was, any idea?

2021 Ruffino Moscato D’Asti – light, pleasant enough but wouldn’t get in the way of conversation

2020 Santa Vittoria Moscato D’Asti – an altogether more serious wine (if that isn’t a contradiction in terms regarding Moscato d’Asti). Better flavour intensity, acidity depth. The clear choice.
My wine shopping and I have never had a problem. Just a perpetual race between the bankruptcy court and Hell.--Rogov
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Jenise » Wed Aug 03, 2022 2:46 pm

Bill Spohn wrote:I forgot to ask Jenise if Bob was tired of eating nothing but trial terrine versions for the last couple of weeks!


No. In fact, I had been saying for weeks, "oh Terrine Day is coming up in a few weeks, need to clear the deck and start cooking. I'd made NOTHING. I had NO PLANS. I had a vague memory of a lobster and green lentil dish I had at Postrio in San Francisco decades ago and had thought I'd try to go in that direction, but a hankering for a Panang style curry was also lurking. But lurk, that's all it did. There was absolutely no activity occuring.

And then, ONE WEEK AGO TODAY at 3 a.m. on a hot, sleepess night, I happened to look at the date on my computer--July 26th--and realized that Terrine Day wasn't still two weeks away, it was six days. SIX!!! When the shock wore off, panic mode set in and first thing that morning I went shopping for the various ingredients with which I might turn that lobster into a Panang Curry terrine. Craving is excellent inspiration! So I brought home bamboo, lemon grass, kaffir lime leaf, quarts of coconut milk and coconut cream, and four pounds of wild gulf shrimp. Using a 5" x 2" hotel pan as a mould, that day I made what you might politely call Shrimp in Panang flavored jello. Good flavor but a frankly childish texture. My plan, based on intuition, had been to cement the flavors and then work toward building texture with pureed vegetation. However I didn't like the taste of the bamboo I'd bought so this first silly little terrine was a disaster.

I was suicidal. I no longer wanted anything to do with Panang Curry.

Meanwhile I'd been nursing a wound for two months over a poor attempt at Lobster Thermidor I'd made for my brother. I'd followed a recipe (something I almost never do) by Emeril that was more bump than BAM. It did not get anywhere close to the flavors of lobster thermidor I'd grown up with at the Dal Rae restaurant on the outskirts of Los Angeles. And in realizing that, I also realized what WOULD have instead produced that flavor.

Well, why not try to turn that into a terrine? It was now Thursday, and I would need mushrooms and shallots. Oh, and sherry, I would need good sherry. Better options on your side of the border than mine so while out shopping, I pulled over and filled out the Arrive Canada application from my phone and headed over the border to Everything Wine in Surrey.

Did I forget to mention that on Day One of this horrific heat wave the Friday before we woke up to find we had no power in our wine cellar? Nada. Zilch. We'd been trying to reach our electrician, the guy who repowered our house during the disastrous freeze of December 31st this year, to no avail. We placed calls daily, but still nothing. As soon as I walked over the threshhold of Everything Wine, my cell phone rang. It was the electrician. He could come Right Now. I had no time to think or even reason with myself over Fino vs. Medium Dry so I literally grabbed a bottle of each and ran, praying to the Border Gods that the Nexus line-up would be minimal.

Later that afternoon, with power to my wine cellar restored, I tasted the sherries. The fino (an Alvear) was good, but the medium was too sweet. However, half and half was a perfect blend. So I made Lobster Thermidor trial #1. On Friday I retasted what I'd made on Thursday which was still all one layer with great flavor but it was still lobster and mushrooms in jello and, on Saturday, Trial #3 with two layers was born, same sherry mix in each layer. The result wasn't perfect but I now had a clear view of what perfect would be. Namely, shiitake mushrooms instead of conventional buttons for their superior silky texture in the cream layer, and not mixing the sherries but using fino only in the lobster aspic and the medium in the mushroom cream layer.

And on Sunday, that's what I made. On the hottest, smokiest day of the year wherein the only a/c in the house is in the wine cellar. Took ten hours. I thought I'd melt or die before I got it done.

So long answer to your question. Did Bob get tired of eating terrines for weeks? Nope; but for six days he got pretty tired of me forgetting to make lunch or dinner because that's what happens when I'm obsessed.
My wine shopping and I have never had a problem. Just a perpetual race between the bankruptcy court and Hell.--Rogov
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Bill Spohn » Wed Aug 03, 2022 2:50 pm

Jenise wrote:Bill, fun to look back on 17 years of these. Bob and I, who were there for the first one and every one since, debated about whether it should be called the 19th, wherein 17 and 18 were cancelled. Since the first was in 2004, we leaned toward 19th to make the math work. Not that you have to....

***
Your descriptions of these are spot-on. That Santa Vittoria was a game changer and the voting was, for once, unanimous. I would seek that one out. Wonder what the price was, any idea?

[.


Well I figure that there is no way we can call it the 19th Terreine event when we only have done 17, although it is the 19th anniversary of the first one.

The Santa Vittoria cost all of $23 C. - a bargain at Everything Wine in N. Van.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Bill Spohn » Wed Aug 03, 2022 2:56 pm

Great story on the terrine development. Did you already have that pan/mould? What had you used it for?

BTW, the Beluga lentils worked well. It made me wonder how it would have worked if you had added a very slight essence of, say, pureed anchovy or anchovy paste to emulate caviar?

Already planning for Terrine 2023?
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Jenise » Wed Aug 03, 2022 3:13 pm

Bill Spohn wrote:Great story on the terrine development. Did you already have that pan/mould? What had you used it for?

BTW, the Beluga lentils worked well. It made me wonder how it would have worked if you had added a very slight essence of, say, pureed anchovy or anchovy paste to emulate caviar?

Already planning for Terrine 2023?


Nope, bought it on a 'just in case' basis for this event. It's plastic, can't be baked in, which is why I was committed to a gelatine-based terrine pretty much from the get-go.

Re the lentils, I knew the look emulated caviar and that was intentional. Never occurred to me, to be honest, to add anchovy to them. I used red wine vinegar, Sicilian olive oil, thyme and salt--made the day before and re-seasoned the morning of.

Speaking of all the trials, I didn't even go into time and expense spent on lentil trials (I now have a pantry full of rejects, nearly all of them shipped here via Amazon or ChefShop). I was trying to find the exact green lentil I remember loving about the first lobster-and-lentil dish from my past--a dish I read about in Wine Spectator circa 1990 funded by Bipin Desai and prepared by Wolfgang Puck to serve at an all-Sauternes dinner in Los Angeles that in all likelihood Tom Hill went to. I was living in Alaska at the time and flew to Postrio restaurant in San Francisco where he'd put it on the menu--just to try the dish.

Anyway, from all those trials, only Beluga got the texture right, and I liked the simplicity of the seasoning.
My wine shopping and I have never had a problem. Just a perpetual race between the bankruptcy court and Hell.--Rogov
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Christina Georgina » Wed Aug 03, 2022 3:30 pm

What wonderful dishes and wines. I love the vicarious thrill. Thanks for the pictures and notes and antic description of the Dinner at the Dal Rae Terrine.
Mamma Mia !
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Tim York » Wed Aug 03, 2022 5:29 pm

Nice wine and pairings but for some reason I'm not getting the pictures.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Jenise » Wed Aug 03, 2022 5:37 pm

Tim, did you try clicking on the listings? That should do it.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Bill Spohn » Wed Aug 03, 2022 7:59 pm

The pics show as jpg in my post - click on it and they show. No idea what I have to do to get the to automatically download. I usually just link to a post I made elsewhere as it is such a pain to get them working on this site.
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Re: TN - Wines That Work with Terrines

by Tim York » Thu Aug 04, 2022 5:39 am

Jenise wrote:Tim, did you try clicking on the listings? That should do it.


Thanks. That works.
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