Author: John Fladd

Wine on Main explains ‘Misunderstood Wines’

One of Emma Stetson’s favorite parts of owning a wine shop — Wine on Main in Concord — is teaching classes.

“We do monthly wine classes,” Stetson said. “Each one has a different theme. For example, last month we [discussed wines from] Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. It could have a more overarching theme, whether it’s about climate, or full-bodied red wines — things like that.”

This month the theme is “Misunderstood Wines.”

“I’ve noticed there are some wines that people are confused about,” Stetson said, “that have misconceptions around them. So I thought it would be fun to correct some of those for people. So that’s one component of the class. And then the other component is that we have Thanksgiving coming up. So the full title of the class is ‘Misunderstood Wines that are Also Perfect for Thanksgiving.’ It’s a way to clear up some misconceptions but also find unique wines for your holiday table.”

Stetson said some misconceptions about particular wines come from their names.

“An example,” she said, “is in the Loire Valley in France. There is a region called Muscadet. It’s a great wine for pairing, especially for Thanksgiving. It has bright acidity and bright fresh fruit flavors.” She finds that many customers are resistant to trying it. “They’ll tell me, ‘No, I hate sweet wines.’ My reaction is, ‘What are you talking about? Muscadet is a dry white wine from France’s Loire Valley!’ and they’re like ‘No, I hate Muscato and Muscatel’; they think in their heads because the words are so similar….”

“It was funny,” she said. “We did a wine tasting back in October with a Muscadet that was delicious, but it was a major hurdle that we had to overcome first.”

Sometimes people assume wines from a particular region are the same. “Riesling kind of goes hand in hand with that too,” Stetson said. Rieslings are white wines that originated in the Rhine River region of Germany, with a reputation for being sweet. Some of them are, Stetson said, but “riesling” covers many different wines. “I have so many people tell me, ‘I don’t like riesling,’ and for the same reason; they say because it’s too sweet. Riesling can be made in a huge array of styles, especially ones made in the Finger Lakes [of New York State]. They are so close to us, are frequently done in a dry style and so aromatic and beautiful.”

November is a good time of the year to clear up some of these misunderstandings, Stetson said. “Riesling is such a classic wine for Thanksgiving, so I wanted to present people with a dry riesling. The aromatics in the wine and even the grape itself will give hints of blossom and honeysuckle. That pairs really well with root vegetables and Thanksgiving seasonal fare. And white wine is kind of a classic pairing with turkey. You could do reds too, but you would choose a lighter red. White goes well with turkey because it won’t overwhelm the poultry.”

Small classes provide a relaxed, focused atmosphere for wine drinkers to wrap their heads around wines, Stetson said.

“Class goers get the opportunity to have a more in-depth understanding of each wine,” she said, “and ask their questions as opposed to at a wine tasting where it’s quick and they’re contending with other people who might be here. I think it’s a great environment for them to have a more personalized experience.”

“I want them to start to figure out what their palate is like,” Stetson said, “what kinds of wines they enjoy and what they gravitate to. For this particular class, I hope people find really fun wines for the holidays that they can share with their family and friends and talk knowledgeably about. Hopefully, clearing up some of these misconceptions in a Misunderstood Wines class will encourage people to try wines that they might have steered clear of because they thought they wouldn’t like them or just didn’t know about them.”

Misunderstood Wines Class
When: Tuesday, Nov. 12, or Wednesday, Nov. 13, from 6:30 to 8 p.m.
Where: Wine on Main, 9 N. Main St., Concord, 897-5828
More: wineonmainnh.com
Each class is limited to 20 people and includes six wines and light snacks. The cost is $35 per person.

Featured Photo: Emma Stetson leading a class. Courtesy photo.

News from the local food scene

• Brewery opening: A new brewery is set to open in Manchester during the first week of November. Republic Brewing Co. (72 Old Granite St. Manchester, 836-3188, republicbrewingcompany.com) will have a Founder’s Club soft opening from 5 to 8 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 1, with a public opening soon after. It will serve six house-brewed beers and pub food, initially focusing on tacos and burgers.

• Market opening: World Market (79 S. River Road, Bedford, 688-8947, stores.worldmarket.com) is slated to have had its ribbon cutting on Wednesday, Oct. 30, at 9:45 a.m. with a grand opening celebration Thursday, Oct. 31, through Saturday, Nov. 2, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Sunday, Nov. 3, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., according to a press release which said the opening will include food and drink tastings.

• Find fish: The University of New Hampshire (unh.edu) has announced a new online tool to help consumers access information about locally sourced seafood products: NH Seafood Finder. According to UNH, the website will allow users to search for seafood by “seafood type (ex: lobsters, oysters, scallops), vendor, location type (ex: off-the-boat, storefront, farmer’s market), time of year, or [search by] map/town.” See bit.ly/NHSeafoodFinder.

• Farmers market opening: Saturday, Nov. 2, will be the opening day for the Concord Winter Farmers Market (7 Eagle Square, Concord, downtownconcordwinterfarmersmarket.com). The Market will be open Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon, November through April.

Shortbread

• 12 Tablespoons (1½ stick) salted (normal) butter
• ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt or kosher salt
• 2 cups (240 g) all-purpose flour
• 1/3 cup (66 g) white sugar
• 1/3 cup (66 g) brown sugar
• ¾ teaspoon baking powder

Filling

• 2 eggs
• 1/3 cup (66 g) white sugar
• 1/3 cup (66 g) brown sugar
• 2 Tablespoons flour
• 2 Tablespoons heavy cream
• ½ teaspoon cayenne or other dried chili powder
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 1¼ lbs. (567 g) sliced apples – weigh them after peeling, coring and slicing them

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Melt the butter in a small pan over medium-low heat. Keep cooking it, stirring it occasionally, until it stops spitting and turns a darker color. This is what bakers call “browning” the butter. Some of the butter is pure fat, but there are some milk solids in it as well. As those solids fry in the melted fat, they start to brown, giving the whole pan of butter a darker color. This is a baking trick that is very, very impressive but extremely straightforward. The only thing you have to be careful about is overcooking it. You want it to get to about the color of a graham cracker, but take it off the heat just before it gets to that point, because the milk solids will continue cooking in the hot fat for another 30 seconds or so.

Stir ¼ teaspoon of salt into the browned butter, and set it aside to cool.

Combine the ingredients for the shortbread, adding the butter/salt mixture last.

Set ¾ cup of the dough aside, and press the rest into an 8×8” baking pan lined with parchment paper. Bake for 15 minutes or until it just starts to turn golden brown. Remove it from the oven, and set it aside to cool. Turn the oven up to 375°F.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl, then add the rest of the filling ingredients together, one at a time.

Spread the apple filling over the baked shortbread, then scatter the reserved shortbread dough over the top.

Bake for 65 minutes, then remove it from the oven and let it cool for an hour or so, then turn out of the pan and cut into nine to 12 portions.

Eat one of these bars, feeling a growing sense of joy and wonder build inside of you.

You will taste the apple filling first, which will be familiar and comforting.

Then, as you chew, you will start to get a little kick from the cayenne pepper, and your eyes will go wide. But then, just before you can get all judgmental, the flavor of the brown butter shortbread will kick in, soothe your outraged taste buds, and leave you with a pervasive feeling of well-being.

“HONEY!” you’ll shout — which will be awkward if you live alone or with roommates — “Come here; you have to taste this!”

At this point your partner, if you have one, will tell you, no thank you, they’re fine.

“Seriously, come taste this!”

“Not right now; I’m busy!” they’ll reply.

The next 10 minutes, as you chase your partner around the house, trying to force an apple bar into their mouth, won’t be pretty, but will be a testament to how shockingly good these apple bars are.

Featured Photo: Photo by John Fladd.

Celebrating bees with a sweet menu

According to Jeff Cole of Barr Hill Gin, Bee’s Knees Week — a national campaign, which includes Friday’s Bee’s Knees Dinner at the the Westbrook Inn (49 S. Main St, Derry., 965-6228, thewestbrookinn.com) on Friday, Oct. 25 — began as a small, almost grass-roots promotion.

“It started out as a restaurant-only program,” Cole said, “where the restaurant would make a ‘bee’s knees’ cocktail, which is a pre-Prohibition cocktail … and they’d donate a portion of every cocktail to the Bee Cause Project, which helped raise awareness for people about pollination and the importance of it. And one of the things they did was put bee observation hives into elementary schools and children’s museums.” This is a cause that was and is important to Barr Hill, because unlike most other spirits, which are distilled from grain, Barr Hill’s gins and vodka are distilled from honey.

The Bee’s Knees event grew, and today it is one of the biggest charitable promotions in the liquor world.

“Something like 3,000 to 3,500 restaurants and retailers participate,” Cole said. “It is a big deal. It’s the largest activation, I guess you’d call it, in the spirits industry.”

How to make a bee’s knees cocktail
Combine 2 ounces very cold gin (Barr Hill would work well for this), ¾ ounce honey syrup, and ¾ ounce fresh squeezed lemon juice with ice in a cocktail shaker. Shake enthusiastically for 30 seconds or so, until you hear the ice start to break up inside the shaker. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Sip with raised eyebrows and a contented smile.

Mark Saragusa, Manager of the Westbrook Inn, said the Bee’s Knees Dinner marks a turning point in the Inn’s year. “We regularly host weddings and events May through October,” he said, “and then during the fall and winter season, outside of our peak wedding season, we were introduced to [Barr Hill]. So this dinner will be unique in that we’ll bring honey tasters for each guest, but also we ask Chef Chris [Chris Viaud of Greenleaf Restaurant in Milford] to feature honey from Bar Hill in all of his courses. He will use local ingredients and set a menu that’s specific to what’s available that week. There will be an instrumental musician playing during the night. There will be a cocktail hour, then the doors open followed by a four-course menu.”

Saragusa said that one of the special aspects of this dinner is the interaction guests have with the chef. “Typically when you go to a restaurant,” he said “you’re not really seeing the chef at all. Between each course, we ask the chef to come out and explain what they did, where they sourced the ingredients, but then also the thought behind that individual plate. And so having Chris and then even Emilee [Pastry Chef Emilee Viaud] with the dessert just gives a different interaction with the guests and the chefs.”

Chef Viaud is looking forward to the Dinner. “This dinner is going to be a fun one,” he said, “where we’re incorporating honey in each course. We are making sure that we’re kind of finding creative ways to highlight the honey so that way you can taste it throughout each course.” He used the main course as an example: “We do a take on a honey-glazed ham. So we’re going to do a coriander and a pink peppercorn honey glaze mix. [We take] a pork loin from one of the local farms and roast that just gently and then brush it with the honey glaze, then reduce that down with a little bit of butter to create a pan sauce. My wife is the pastry chef at my restaurants as well, so she’ll be making a honey panna cotta.”

“I think it’s going to be a fun-filled dinner,” Chef Viaud said.

2nd Annual Bee’s Knees Dinner
When: Friday, Oct. 25, from 6 to 9 p.m.
Where: Westbrook Inn (49 S. Main St., Derry, 965-6228, thewestbrookinn.com
Tickets: $95 at Eventbrite.com.
The four-course dinner will be cooked by two-time James Beard Award-nominated Chef Chris Viauld of Greenleaf Restaurant and Pastry Chef Emilee Viaud.

Featured Photo: Chris Viaud. Courtesy photo.