Category: Food

The idea had been a solid one: walking around Boston’s North End, comparing the ricotta pie at as many Italian bakeries as possible.

Okay — I was comparing the ricotta pie. The rest of my party was comparing cannoli.

I get it — cannoli are good. Extremely good. But let’s face it. They’re no ricotta pie. I feel strongly about ricotta pie — to the extent that I fervently believe that if they held a Miss Greater Boston Italian Pastry beauty competition, an actual slice of ricotta pie would almost certainly win. Yes, the other girls would cry.

Until they ate the winner.

At any rate, we had taken a short break from pastry-eating and had stepped into an Italian deli to get warm. The rest of my group was oohing and ahhing over imported pasta and balsamic vinegar. I was looking at the olives in the deli case, when I accidentally made eye contact with the man behind the counter.

He gave me a half chin lift nod of recognition, then, seemingly recognizing something in me, he asked, “Are you an Olive Guy?”

As it happens, I am an olive guy.

“Yeah,” I said, trying to keep it cool, “I’m an Olive Guy.”

He looked briefly to each side, as if he might be overheard, then reached into the case and tapped a bin of small black olives. His voice dropped to just above a whisper.

“These, My Friend,” he confided in me, “these are the ’68 Barracuda of Olives.” He looked at me for my reaction.

I looked at the olives critically — I mean, it was already a foregone conclusion that I was going to buy the olives, but I didn’t want to look too easy. They were very small, about the size of black jelly beans, but darker. Much darker. The air around them almost shimmered as it was tugged at by their blackness.

“Yeah,” I said after a few seconds, “Gimme half a pound, please.”

My new friend didn’t move. He stood there, watching me impassively.

“Um, and another half a pound in another container,” I added.

He nodded very slightly with approval, and got me my olives.

They were extremely good olives.

’68 Barracuda

At this point, after that very olive-centric story, you could be excused for expecting an olive-based cocktail. And indeed there is a lot to be said for, and about, dirty martinis, the gold standard — the ’68 Barracuda, if you will — of olive-based cocktails, but that is a study for another time. No, this time, we’re going to go in the other direction — the Barracuda.

A Barracuda is a standard if not terribly well-known cocktail — very fruit-forward, and in spite of its name a fairly innocuous drink. Yes, it has a fairly lengthy list of ingredients, but it is a pleasant if not terribly memorable cocktail.

This is a tweak on the original.

Ingredients

• ice
• ⅔ ounce Galliano, an Italian, vanilla-forward liqueur, in a freakishly beautiful bottle
• ⅓ ounce grenadine
• 1 small Fresno pepper
• ⅔ ounce white rum
• ⅓ ounce fresh-squeezed lime juice
• ⅔ ounce pineapple juice
• sparkling wine — I used Cava.

Slice the pepper into a shaker, and muddle it thoroughly.

Add an ounce or so of white rum to the shaker, then “dry shake” it. This means to shake it without ice. (The capsaicin — the spicy compounds — of the pepper are alcohol-soluble, which means that the straight rum will extract them pretty well. They are not water-soluble, so the juices or ice would interfere with the process.)

Add everything but the sparkling wine to an ice-filled rocks glass, then top with the wine.

It’s up to you whether to stir, or not to stir.

The juices and grenadine give a dependable Tiki-like background flavor to a standard Barracuda. Regular white rum is happy to hide in the background, wrapped in a comfortable vanilla blanket of Galliano. The star of this show, singing out proudly like it’s ’80s Night at a Tiki karaoke, is the Fresno chile.

Why Fresno?

I’m glad you asked. For years my go-to chile has been a classic jalapeño. It’s got a great flavor. It’s hot, but not too hot. It’s been great.

But sadly, in recent years it’s let itself go. Eighty percent of the time it has no heat and even less flavor; it’s usually in lawn-clippings territory. The other 20 percent of the time it’s as if it’s sobered up and tries to make up for lost time, and blows the top of your head off. Fresnos are more dependable.

And, not for nothin’, they’re red, which suits this drink better anyway.

Featured photo: ’68 Barracuda. Photo by John Fladd.

Pairing wines with NFL playoff chicken wings

It is the NFL playoff season and time to have those football-centered house parties. The mainstay of those parties is, of course, chicken wings! Deep-fried chicken wings have southern roots, but coating the wings in a spicy butter-based sauce reportedly has its roots in Buffalo, New York, the home of the Bills, who just halted the New England Patriots in their pursuit of advancing in the playoffs. Recipes for preparing those cherished wings can vary from a lemony-pepper sauce to a Sriracha-based sauce to a myriad of mustard- or vinegar-based sauces with varying amounts of sweetness and spice.

It goes without saying that beer certainly has a place at the table with all those wings, sour cream and celery, but there are several types of wine that can also be seated next to those revered wings, and we will explore a few of them. When considering which wine to serve, there should be a balance between the buttery sauce coating those wings and a slightly acidic wine that refreshes the palate.

Our first wine, the 2017 Château de Fesles Anjou Chenin Sec (originally priced at $59.99, and reduced to $21.99 at the New Hampshire Liquor & Wine Outlets), comes from the Anjou region of the Loire River Valley of France. The color of this chenin blanc is straw that somehow has a sparkle even though it is a still wine. It has a floral nose of citric blossoms that transform to the palate with dried fruit, honey and toasted bread. This slightly citric wine will clean the tongue of the rich, complex, sweet and spicy notes of those wings.

Our second wine, the 2017 La Grand Comtadine Premières Vendanges Vacqueyras (originally priced at $64.99, and reduced to $22.99 at the New Hampshire Liquor & Wine Outlets), is a classic Mediterranean Southern Rhone red wine. Produced as a blend of 50 percent grenache, 40 percent shiraz/syrah and 10 percent mourvedre, it offers texture and complexity with ripe fruit that works nicely with the warm, red sauces coating the wings. The color is a deep red with a nose of dried plums. To the tongue, the fruit recedes with good, strong tannins of leather. This is a wine with body that will complement those wings.

Our third wine, the 2020 Vigne Regali Rosa Regale Brachetto D’Acqui Sparkling Red Wine by Banfi (originally priced at $19.99, and reduced to $14.99 at the New Hampshire Liquor & Wine Outlets), is an interesting study of pairing the slight sweetness of this wine to a tomato, mustard, vinegar-based sauce. Castello Banfi is a family-owned vineyard estate and winery located in the Brunello region of Tuscany. Fermentation of 100 percent brachetto grapes takes place in temperature-controlled stainless-steel vats, with bottling immediately afterward. This careful attention to time and temperature results in its slight effervescence and a rich garnet color. To the nose it is full of raspberries and strawberries. To the tongue there is a slight delicate softness that settles to a clean, dry finish. While this wine is frequently paired to desserts, it holds up well to barbecue-style wings.

Our fourth wine, Comte de Saint Aignan Crémant de Loire Brut Première Étoile (originally priced at $28.99, reduced to $14.99 at the New Hampshire Liquor & Wine Outlets), is a blend of 60 percent chenin blanc, 35 percent chardonnay and 5 percent cabernet franc). The grapes for this sparkling wine come from the Crémant-de-Loire appellation of the Loire River Valley in central France, producing a color that is light gold (almost clear) with persistent but sparse bubbles. The nose is slightly nutty with notes of dark honey. To the mouth there are bold citric notes that will complement the freshness of a lemon-pepper sauce on your wings.

So, in settling in to watch your next almost favorite team roll through the playoff brackets, consider these alternatives to beer in pairing with those ubiquitous chicken wings.

Featured photo: Courtesy photo.