Los Angeles Food & Wine Festival presents: Lunch at CUT
Roberta Rinaldi, Beverly Hills Wine Pairing Examiner
October 16, 2011
Last Friday, CUT’s Beverage Director, Dana Farner, and Chef de Cuisine, Ari Rosenson, teamed up with visiting chef, Paul Bartollota, to present a smartly conceived, flawlessly executed wine pairing lunch--one of eleven held citywide as part of the first Los Angeles Food & Wine Festival. Congrats go to the folks at Coastal Luxury Management, organizers of LAFW’s wildly successful wine events. It was their brainchild to match an out of town celebrity chef, with the reignining chef of a local premier restaurant, merging their talents to create these eagerly anticipated feasts.
Diners couldn’t have been in better hands than the featured culinary trio’s. Ms. Farner, with CUT since 2006, is one level away from becoming a Master Sommelier and has a spot on palate. Her years of experience coordinating stylish wine dinners were evident in the intelligence behind Friday’s pairings and their seamless service. When asked how the menu came together, she said that first, the restaurant was assigned wines produced by vineyards participating in the festival from which to develop the multi-course meal. Then, came brainstroming with the two chefs, who have very different backgrounds, yet proved complementary in style.
Two-time James Beard awardee, Chef Bartolotta, is the inspiration behind Bartolotta: Ristorante di Mare at Wynn Las Vegas, where his focus is on Italian preparations of seafood species native to the Mediterranean. Milwaukee-born, Bartolotta became enamoured of this cuisine while training in Europe with some of France and Italy’s most distinguished chefs: Paul Bocuse, Valentino Marcatilli, Angelo Paracucchi and Roger Verge. Upon returning to the States, he was an immediate success, earning a three star review from The New York Times with his first restaurant, San Domenico. He has continued to garner nearly every culinary accolade imagineable with subsequent ventures, many of them under the umbrella of The Bartolotta Restaurant Group, jointly owned with brother Joe.
By contrast, Chef Rosenson is a homegrown Puck prodigy, who first met his mentor at age 10, when he interviewed him at Spago for a school assignment. Legend has it that at this meeting, little Ari whipped up his “signature omelette” for the icon. Must have been some omelette, because at 16 he approached Puck again, this time for a job and was welcomed into Spago’s kitchen. Rosenson’s is a story of rising through the ranks, starting out at prep stations, then going step by step from kitchen manager to sous chef, all the way to Chef de Cuisine. The artistry he shows with food is a testimony to the viability of an apprenticeship versus culinary school path to chef-dom.
The menu with tasting notes and pairing observations:
Tray-Passed Hors d’oeuvres:
House Made Kobe Beef Pastrami on Rye with Gruyere
Duck Liver Pasticcio
TunaTartare Sandwiches with Wasabi on Togarashi Toast
Skewered Loin of Rabbit with Crispy Artichokes
Served with Scharffenberger Cellars “Brut Excellence” NV, Mendocino. 65% Pinot Noir, 35% Chardonnay. Wow! An ode to the versatility of sparkling wine with diverse flavors and textures. Brut Excellence showed intense yeastiness and berry notes well-suited to the rye bread and inherent sweet-spicy elements of Rosenson’s mini pastrami sandwiches. It had enough body and acidity to stand up to the well-marbled red meat and oozing, full-flavored gruyere. Chef Bartollota’s ethereal duck liver (whipped with butter, black truffle, Marsala and bay leaf) sat on a puff of toasted brioche. The wine’s depth, and smooth mouthfeel from malolactic fermentation, harmonized with the liver’s silkiness and earthy flavors; its fine, lively bead and citrusy crispness played a wonderful counterpoint.
First course: Grilled Sicilian Amberjack with Radicchio and Anchovy Sauce served with Tayson Pierce Durell Vineyards Chardonnay, 2009, Sonoma Coast. This is the quintessential big, buttery California Chard with loads of vanilla and pear. It is unfiltered and unfined, aged 15 months in 60% new French oak and 40% in one year used barrels. Vintner, Eric J. Rothchild, who attended the lunch, described his wine as, “...remarkably balanced with complexity...plush, round and luxuriously mouthfilling.” He also talked about how the wine will age, “As it matures, its aromas will be fuller and it’s going to become rounder, with even more fruit in evidence.” Bartolotta’s amberjack, a firm, white, meaty fish, was perfectly weighted to the full body of the wine. It was a touch of genius to foresee that the inherent bitterness of radicchio and savory depth of anchovy would soften the youthful oak, showing off the fruit in this wine beautifully.
Second course: Classic Piemontese Meat Filled Agnollotti with Butter and Sage served with Canihan Family Cellars Exuberance Pinot Noir, 2008, Sonoma. Winery owner, Bill Canihan, reserves the Exuberance label for his finest wines. Being a former mortgage banker, the handle is a nod to Alan Greenspan's comment about ...the “irrational exuberance” of his era’s real estate markets, applied to the blind optimism required for winemaking. Grapes for this effort were organically and biodynamically farmed, aged 100% in new French oak for 22 months, then bottled unfiltered and unfined. It is redolent of cherry cola, dark berry, leather and mushroom, and luscious with cinnamon, bright cherry and raspberry mid-palate, ending in a medium finish. The meat used to stuff Bartollota’s agnollotti, and create the base for its sauce, had highly concentrated flavors from long braising, which made a perfect marriage with the wine’s suavity and richness.
Third course: Duo of Snake River Farm’s Kobe Beef: Slow Braised Cheek with Autumn Root Vegetables and Grilled New York Steak with Celery Root-Wasabi Puree and Yuzu Kocho Emulsion served with Chappellet Pritchard Hill Cabernet Sauvignon, 2008, St. Helena. A blend of 76% Cabernet Sauvignon, 16% Petit Verdot and 8% Malbec. Aged 100% in new French oak for 20 months, and an additional 8 months in bottle, Chappellet’s Pritchard Hill is full-bodied and multifacited, with aromas of sweet, ripe black fruits, baking spices and mocha that persist on the palate. It has a smooth, mouth-coating texture, with a hint of something green on the finish: fennel? eucalyptus? Sturdy, but integrated tannins, make it accessible now, yet also age-worthy. Great rendition of a classic pairing: big red with big red meat.
Fourth course: Fugi Apple Tarte, Cassis Sorbet, Mutsu Apples and Yuzu Caramel served with Joseph Phelps Eisrebe, 2009, St. Helena. 100% Scheurebe. Made with grapes that are commercially frozen and aged in stainless steel to achieve an eiswein-like dessert wine, this leaps from the glass with scents of ripe stone fruit, lemon, honeysuckle and pineapple, that carry through on the palate. The brilliance of this pairing was in the use of black currant and sweet, instead of tart green apples, since Eisrebe has less keen acid than representative wines of its style, and could have been overwhelmed by tangier fruits. Gooey yuzu caramel was a lovely match for the wine’s sweetness and viscosity.
Big thanks to everyone involved for a memorable dining experience, and to the first Los Angeles Food & Wine Festival for gracing Angelenos with such a comprehensive, innovative and delicious wine program its first year out.
