SharecroppersEight courses, six wines, four hours: Chef Rich’s Artisan Dinner was tremendous fun. Held on the patio February 19 at Sage on the Coast, it was a rock concert for foodies. Chef Kris greeted us with a smoked trout and potato amuse-bouche that worked a diabolical spell. We left off our discussions of New York publishing and modern Russian dance only to fall upon the next course like wild dogs. Joe Davis of Arcadian, who brought two of his chardonnays, three pinot noirs and a syrah, was happy to share the “groupie-love” of a winemaker dinner with Alex Weiser of Weiser Family Farms. Alex, free from the hectoring French chefs at the market (more crosnes!) gently reintroduced the potato to the Newport palate and lionized the unhybridized, extolling the flavors of tiny colored varieties that were discovered and named (as in myths) rather than developed for commercial durability. It was his Nantes carrots, too delicate for corporate farming, which made the carrot soup so ravishingly sweet. The di Cicco broccolini accompanying the melt-in-your-mouth duck breast were side shoots of Italian broccoli once routinely plowed under until their flavor was finally appreciated. And his crosnes, tender white corkscrew tubers, like seashells the size of a Barbra Streisand fingernail, made our lobster and black truffle cream utterly unique and delicious. Tasting three pinots in succession we detected not subtle nuances, but characters large and immediate as handwriting. (Look for the 2002 Sleepy Hollow Vineyard and 2001 Gary’s Vineyard on our wine lists.) Joe and wife Jill mingled, bottle in hand, chatting about acres hidden, promising, grudging and sold, and the early days when Joe and Rich started their businesses, “two total geeks about quality who could be geeky together.” Watch this space for the date of Sage’s Spring Planting Picnic. |
Little Brown OnesIn his quixotic pursuit of quality, Chef Rich has decreed his quiches and crème brulees shall be made only with the freshest eggs. That means one to two days from orchard to mixing bowl. Yes, the hens at Peacock farms summer in the persimmon orchard, ambling, laying, pecking at the milling grains provided by a nearby organic flour mill. Not a commercial operation, according to Scott, who sells them at the Farmers’ Market, just a small backyard flock. Their brown eggs have a deeper flavor and larger, sun-yellow yolks that aerate better, creating fluffier omelets and custards that won’t emerge rubbery or flat. You’ll taste the difference in Kathy’s Bananas Foster Crème Brulee this month, and in our Sage quiche, a savory custard baked in a pie crust with Black Forest ham, caramelized onions and fresh spinach.Fresh Egg Quiche
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Eastbluff Shopping Center
2531 Eastbluff Newport Beach, CA 92660 949.718.9650 |
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Crystal Cove Promenade 7862 East Coast Highway Newport Beach, CA 92657 949.715.7243 |
your buonasera! with stony silence. At least the cats are friendly. You sit by your window overlooking the Lumbi car park and the Mediterranean beyond and wait for the phone to ring. You wait in your shadowy room in shadowy silence. And as you wait, gorging on the dark heart of your sweet blood orange, darker, darker even than faithless heart of your Sicilian lover, the sea surrenders its last light.
to the Sage menu in March. The vermilion purée, combined with stock, shallots and butter, makes an unbelievably good sauce for the Maple Leaf Farms duck breast. And the fresh squeezed, antioxidant-rich juice, shaken with Absolut Mandarin Vodka, makes a fabulous blood orange martini we call The Sicilian. No one in particular, cretino.
Lamborn conducted our first wine dinner at Sage years ago and we’re proud to feature this new release from him, his wife, and winemaker Heidi Peterson Barrett. Two critically acclaimed and reasonably priced reds new to the Eastbluff wine list: the 2001 Von Strasser Estate Cabernet from the Diamond Mountain region (rugged untillable hills between St. Helena and Calistoga), and the 2004 Blue Jay Pinot Noir from Roessler Cellars, made from Anderson Valley grapes grown west of Philo. Both are superbly crafted and a steal, so come in and try them before they sell out. At Sage On the Coast's second Saturday wine tasting Ian HIll guides our sampling of California Zinfandels, March 11 at 2pm.