Environmentally Friendly Cooking: GRILL | Grilled Chicken Portabello Jack Burger

As we all know, summer temperatures can be down right brutal and some states get a double whammy with humidity that make curly hair go straight and an edgy woman postal. So why slave over a hot oven and waste precious energy when you can stoke up the grill, chill and have a nice relaxing, home cooked meal right from your grill?

Recipe: Grilled Chicken Portabello Jack Burger

Wine: For starters I recommend Avanthia Godello | $30 bottle, or I would grab a South African Bay Sauvignon Blanc | $11.33 bottle (this is the $11.00 bottle of wine that taste like $50.00) while your chillin and preparing your grillin. This is a very crisp, fresh, wine that is sure to wet your whistle while your waiting for the food to cook.

Dinner is ready, either stay with your white or if you like me, you’ll pull out some reds. I would go into my cellar and grab me a Syrah like Rockblock Syrah|$45.00 bottle from Domaine Serene or perhaps maybe a Pinot Noir like Ici La-Bas “Les Reveles” Pinot Noir | $26.00 bottle, a little less expensive but equally delightful.

Now sit back relax and enjoy and realize this is the good life!

What You Will Need:
2 chicken breasts seasoned and grilled
1 clove garlic minced
2 medium portabello mushrooms sliced
2 pieces of Monterey jack cheese or your favorite
2 whole wheat buns

Add a little olive oil to a medium saute pan, add garlic and then add portabellos, season lightly salt and pepper. Saute them until they are a nice golden brown. Grill chicken and then toast buns. Add cheese and then portabello. Serve immediately with your favorite salad I added BBQ beans and corn on the cob on the side. If you have a side burner on your grill you could easily do all of this outdoors and keep the house cool

Recipe compliments of Katie Mahanes head chef at Don’t Forget To Kiss The Cook!

2007 Ici La-Bas “Les Reveles” Pinot Noir

Fantastic Pinot Noir by wine rock star Jim Clendenen! One of my favorites. PURCHASE Ici La-Bas HERE

Anderson Valley is located in the coastal mountains of California in Mendocino County. This area was pioneered by Louis Roderer; he was looking for a grape growing region which had cold winter and a short mild growing season similar to Champagne. The Elke Vineyard is on the warmer southern end of the Anderson Valley, close to Boonville. The vineyard was planted more than twenty years ago, and is mainly selections of Pinot Noir of historical importance. Ici/La-Bas has been sourcing fruit from Tom and Mary Elke’s vineyard near Boonville since 1997.

Winemaking: The grapes arrived at winery in perfect condition and very cold. This allowed for a 4 day “cold soak” to extract the water-soluble fruit driven components from the must. During the 14 day fermentation the must was punched down twice a day. After completion of fermentation the wine was pressed, lightly settled and barreled down into 75% new Francois Freres barrels. The wine was kept in these barrels until March of 2009. The flavor foundation of the superb, expensive French barrels is one of the most important components of the ICI/LA-BAS wine style.

Wine-Rich, leesy aromas of strawberries and cream are the first impressions. The hallmarks of the Elke Pinot are its fine persistent finish and concentrated texture. First impressions are followed by a cascade of evolving flavors and perceptions.

Drinkability: Short term drinkers will find the wine fresh and intense and could be a great match for wild salmon. Longer term cellaring will reveal secondary aromas of herbs and hints of harder spice.

2005 Alexander Valley Vineyard “Cyrus”

It’s a rare year indeed when a winemaker has the opportunity to work with large volumes of fruit that also happens to be of exceptional quality. But that’s exactly what happened in 2005 and those fortunate circumstances provided Winemaker Kevin Hall with the choice of a much larger array of barrels to craft the 2005 CYRUS. PURCHASE CYRUS HERE

This proprietary Bordeaux blend is traditionally produced from our best lots. In 2005, the foundation for CYRUS was Cabernet Sauvignon from three different estate vineyards, a blend of old and new vines offering notes of black cherry, blueberry and cassis. To balance the big flavors of the Cab and contribute to the weighty mid-palate of the wine, Kevin blended equal amounts of Merlot and Cabernet Franc. A dollop of Malbec and Petit Verdot intensified the color and made this a truly multi-dimensional wine that offers beautiful flavors of dark cherries, plums and chocolate.

Food Pairing: This is a big structured wine that would work perfectly with a pepper-crusted grilled beef tenderloin or even a intensely flavored cheese like an aged New York Cheddar.

Awards:
Double Gold – 2009 San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition
Gold, Critics Choice Award – 2010 San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo Wine Competition
Best of Show Red – 2009 Hilton Head Wine Fest
Gold – 2009 Houston Rodeo Wine Competition

About Alexander Valley Vineyards:
Cyrus Alexander, the man for whom we named our top wine (and the namesake for the Alexander Valley) arrived in the area in 1840 in search of land suitable for ranching. Cyrus was drawn to the property where our vineyards now reside by a number of qualities including good soil and a plentiful supply of water and timber. The adobe he built on the property is currently used by Alexander Valley Vineyards for wine dinners including the annual CYRUS dinner held every year in mid-March to mark release of the new vintage.

Vineyard Notes:
76% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Merlot, 10% Cabernet Franc, 2% Malbec, 2% Petit Verdot

2008 Avanthia Godello

We got lucky that night when we discovered these wines.  Avanathia Godello was the first wine we tried that night, before we had the orgasmic Mas de Can Blau, and what a lovely surprise it was. It is not at all what you would expect from the Godello grape. This white wine was fresh, crisp, fruit forward, off dry, and absolutely one of my favorites. It is a $30.00 bottle of wine that tastes like it is $75.00! This winery is a new project between Bodegas Godeval, the Gil family of Jumilla, and Jorge Ordonez. It is located in the mountains next to El Barco de Valdeorras, in the province of Orense (Galicia), in the northwest of Spain. Find out more and PURCHASE.

2007 Bien Nacido Vineyard Chardonnay Santa Maria Valley

This sexy Chardonnay really impressed me. An opulent, expansive chardonnay replete with flavors of ripe tropical fruits, creamy hazelnuts, and vanilla oak, steely minerality mixed subtle flavors of pear, apple and citrus. Its voluptuous nature is kept in line by a sound core of mouthwatering acidity that keeps you coming back to the glass for more. PURCHASE WINE HERE

This sexy Chardonnay really impressed me. An opulent, expansive chardonnay replete with flavors of ripe tropical fruits, creamy hazelnuts, and vanilla oak, steely minerality mixed subtle flavors of pear, apple and citrus. Its voluptuous nature is kept in line by a sound core of mouthwatering acidity that keeps you coming back to the glass for more.

This wine is entirely from Block K at Bien Nacido Vineyard. For the last 20 years Au Bon Climat has been the only winery getting grapes from this block. K Block is part of the original Bien Nacido vineyard planted in 1972. An elegant, restrained wine, this Bien Nacido has power lurking just below the surface, which will become more evident after a bit of cellaring.

2005 Perrin & Fils “Les Sinardes,” Chateauneuf-Du-Pape

From the owners of the very famous Chateau de Beaucastel, Perrin & Fils – The Southern Rhône bad asses! This is an excellent red wine blend of 70% Grenache, 15% Syrah and 15% Mourvèdre. PURCHASE WINE HERE

In 1909 Pierre Tramier bought the property and Beaucastel then passed to his son-in-law, Pierre Perrin, a scientist who considerably increased the vineyard holding. His efforts were continued by Jacques Perrin until 1978. Today the torch is carried by Jean Pierre and François, sons of Jacques. But Marc, Pierre, Thomas and Matthieu, who represent the fifth generation, are ready to pursue this fabulous family history.

Perrin & Fils Châteauneuf-du-Pape les Sinards comes from the younger vines at Château de Beaucastel, together with a leased vineyard of 7 hectares that lies to the west of Beaucastel, in the commune of Orange.

The wine is vinified in the same manner as Château de Beaucastel and is matured in casks for a year before bottling. It features a wide range of aromas such as kirsch, lavender, pepper and other spices; on the palate there is a well-rounded combination of fruit and supple tannins. An intense red color, very dark. A nose of black fruits, kirsch, lavender, roasted lamb, garigue. Full-bodied, very ripe palate with a nice textures and soft tannins.

Reviews:
“Perrin & Fils aspires to establish its reputation specializing in vineyard-designated communal wines from the Southern Rhône. And as the company’s head vineyard scout, [Pierre] Perrin must unearth diamonds in the rough. ‘I am a discoverer of crus,’ he says. ‘It’s our job to how the complexity and specificity of the terroirs in the Southern Rhône.’” WINE SPECTATOR

Jean-Pierre and François Perrin – chosen among the Most Influential Wine Personalities of the last 20 Years. “The Perrins believe in natural winemaking, unfiltered wines, and routinely produce long-lived classics that are among the finest in the world.” Robert M. Parker, Jr.’s THE WINE ADVOCATE

Tasting Notes
An intense red color, very dark. A nose of black fruits, kirsch, lavender, roasted lamb, garigue. Full-bodied, very ripe palate with a nice textures and soft tannins.

Food Pairing Notes
Goes perfectly with a roasted Lamb with Thyme

The Wine Vacuum – Store It, Don’t Pour It!

Another handy dandy gadget every wino needs for their wine bar is the the Wine Vacuum. What the heck is a wine vacuum you ask! Well I’m going to try to explain it. Here goes nothing!

Often you buy wine and don’t finish the bottle for whatever reason but you don’t want to waste it and aren’t sure how to preserve it or if you are like me you like to experiment with lot’s of different wines every night and don’t wait for “special” occasions to drink, everyday is a special occasion in my book, hell I’m alive and super healthy that’s worth celebrating!  So there you are in your living room sitting back, feet up immersed into your favorite weekly series or book when you get up to go to bed only to realize you have half of bottle left. Damn it! Your liver is on overload but you don’t want to pour this yummy dinner down the drain…so you need an alternative.

What is one to do? Some would try to insert the cork back into the bottle with great strenuous effort and little success while others are a bit smarter and use decorative wine stoppers. The problem with the cork is that while you may get it back into the bottle it will more than likely suffer breakage and cracking which exposes the wine to oxygen. The decorative wine stopper while cute, also doesn’t stop oxygen from reaching the wine.

Why does that matter?
When you open a bottle of wine it is instantly exposed to air and when wine is exposed to air for any extended period of time, let’s say overnight,  it turns or rather is oxidized or spoiled which tastes flat or stale. In order to finish that lovely bottle of wine that you started you need to remove the oxygen from the bottle and the best tool to do this is a pump which comes in many styles and names. One of my favorite is the Vacu Vin Preserver for $10.99 which comes with one rubber stoppers. The idea behind the pump is that it sucks the air out of the bottle allowing you to get a one or two more days out of the wine. It won’t preserve it forever and every wine is different but I usually get one to two additional drinking days which is more than enough time for me to finish the bottle off before it spoils or goes flat and I don’t have to waste it!

Whether you purchase The VacuVin Pump or whatever, they should all “click” when you’ve successfully extracted all the air from the bottle. This doesn’t take a mental giant to work and is an added benefit to your wine tool kit and your pocket book. Make sure to purchase extra stoppers because more than likely your going to use them, especially if you entertain and have a few bottles of your favorite wine left!