Dinner - French Wines

 This past Tuesday I decided that I wanted to wine and dine myself because all my friends were busy and I was left with a few hours to kill, so I decided this would be the perfect time to sample some of the amazing wines we sell at the Vintage Cellar. When it came time to decide what theme to make the dinner, I decided that I should start with the country that basically created the idea of wine and culinary pairings - La France!

Now on a college budget it is not too easy to make many traditional French dishes, but I improvised where necessary and still had a great time making everything and thought it went really well! So without further ado, let's dive into the courses.

Course 1: Botrytized wine and liver paste!

For my first course, I decided to go with an absolute French classic - Bordeaux botrytized wine and Pate! I decided to go with a Monzabillac instead of Sauternes, the classic (still botrytized and very close to Sauternes), and I had a black truffle pate. This pairing tends to throw a lot of people off, but I can promise it lives up to the hype! I have always been a fan of pate, and the grainy meatiness of the pate paired perfectly with the sweet honey and fig notes of the Monzabillac.

Course 2: Salad and Muscadet

I decided to go with a refreshing salad for my second course. Unfortunately I was fresh out of basically every salad dressing so I went with a Southwest dressing. However, this actually ended up pairing really well with this Muscadet, which was aged sur lie and therefore had some mellow flavors to compliment the light spice of the dressing. 

Luckily, halfway through my second course, my friend Matt

came and we finished the dinner together!

Main Course: Buffalo Chicken, Risotto, and Bordeaux

For the main course, I decided to stray a little from traditional French cuisine (mainly because this is what I had in my fridge) and I went with Buffalo chicken and mushroom risotto. I paired this with a 2016 Medoc Bordeaux, which is not a normal pairing for chicken but with the buffalo sauce it actually stood up pretty well to the wine. 2016 is gaining a reputation as a legendary vintage for Bordeaux, so this wine was actually much better than I thought it would be. The dark fruit notes paired well with the spiciness of the sauce and rounded the dish out.

Dessert: Chocolate Mousse, Strawberries, and Monzabillac

But what is a French dinner without a dessert?! I took what ingredients I had available and was able to whip up a delicious chocolate mousse and had some strawberries to go along with it. I also used this course to enjoy the Monzabillac in its normal use - as a dessert wine. The honey notes of the wine added a whole new dimension to the chocolate and fruit flavors. This was really not that difficult to make and honestly my go-to fancy dessert.

France, being the Mecca of fine wine it is, has so many wines you could have a multi-course French dinner every day for a week. However, I was very happy with the wines I had for this dinner, and I thought they did an amazing job showcasing just how different wines from basically the same region can be.