Tag: 201126

Wines for giving thanks

Wines to consider for your Thanksgiving menu

“This Thanksgiving will be unlike all other Thanksgivings!”

We have heard that expression far too many times, haven’t we? We will all be hunkered down, safe in our households, seated for our traditional feast, but there will be differences around us, some subtle, some not-so-subtle. Crazy Uncle Larry who begins his Thanksgiving Day cocktail hour at 10 a.m. will be (thankfully) absent and the feast may be a bit simpler, a bit smaller. For the early afternoon, we plan to have another couple over for hors d’oeuvres in the driveway, surrounded by patio heaters! For our dinner, instead of a large turkey, we will have a roast duck. It will be smaller and simpler but still very enjoyable!

We still need to celebrate with our friends and family, and with wine paired to the extended courses. The possibilities are endless.

Chic Barcelona Brut Cava (originally priced at $14.99, on sale at the New Hampshire Liquor & Wine Outlets at $7.99) is a bargain not to be passed up. A blend of 35 percent macabeu, 35 percent xarello and 30 percent parellada grapes, this wine hails from the Penedès region of Catalonia, Spain, south of Barcelona, where the climate is Mediterranean with continental influences meaning that it tends to have cold winters and slightly milder summers than the interior countryside produces full and fresh wines resulting in a slower maturation of the grapes. Cava is the chief wine of this region and it is made in the traditional, or Champagne, method, which means it has a second fermentation in the bottle. The color of this wine is a light straw. The tiny bubbles that rise from the bottom of the glass are not as intense as with Champagne and the nose is bright and fresh, lacking in the yeasty brioche nose one identifies with a Champagne. To the tongue, the taste is fresh and citric but lacking in length. This is an excellent accompaniment to hors d’oeuvres, and a great way to start the meal. Alcoholic content is 11½ percent.

Höpler Grüner Veltliner, 2019 (originally priced at $16.99, on sale at the New Hampshire Liquor & Wine Outlets at $14.99) is an Austrian wine from the eastern part of the country, from vines planted along the Danube River and on the banks of Lake Neusiedl. The Höpler winery is located in Burgenland, just 45 minutes from Vienna. The soils range from gravel with some clay to rich, fertile well-draining silt. Cold winters allow the vines to go dormant, but hot summers with substantial sunshine and humidity rising from the nearby lake allow the grapes to develop a balance between fruit, flavor and great acidity. The color is straw with a strong overtone of green. The green results from the selection of greener grapes, producing a wine that is more aromatic than the wine made from grapes that are more yellow. To the nose the wine has notes of lime and minerality, along with some white pepper spice. This wine falls between sauvignon blanc (acid and green grassy notes) and riesling (tropical and mineral notes). To the taste, this wine has tropical fruit — pineapple with lemon-lime acidity. This is an ideal wine to cool and just sip, alongside the cava, to enjoy along with oysters, or to transition to the main course, the bird.

Schug 2017 Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir (originally priced at $32.99, on sale at the New Hampshire Liquor & Wine Outlets at $14.99) is a blend of pinot noir grapes from select vineyards located in the western portion of Carneros, a region on the coast of the San Pablo Bay. A cool, breezy climate allows the grapes to mature slowly and retain their natural acidity, with bright flavors of red cherries, raspberries and spice. There is also a touch of tart pomegranate on the tongue. The wine is aged in large neutral oak casks and older French oak barrels to keep new oak flavors to a minimum. The finish is long and reminds me of cranberry, and therefore perfect to pair with that bird! It will nicely cut through the buttery fat of the bird’s side dishes.

So, while the Thanksgiving celebration may be small and ever so intimate, it should be savored. The pandemic will pass; the memories will live on. Happy Thanksgiving.

Cocktails as a holiday family avoidance strategy

Holidays are traditionally the time for extended families to gather together. Amid all the hastening and chastening, they are also a time for avoiding family. Hiding in the bathroom or the garage is a time-honored Thanksgiving activity.

But this year — as with all aspects of our lives — things are different. The family we might be the most eager to avoid may also be the same people we’ve been with 24 hours a day for the last nine months. At this point most of us have used up pretty much every viable excuse to leave a room.

Except perhaps one: a cocktail.

Please notice that I have specified “A” cocktail. Aside from flirting with dangerous habits or an outraged liver, heavy drinking rarely produces the outcome you might be looking for. Before you get to the Comfortably Numb stage, you will probably pass through the Karaoke stage, and even the “Let Me Text the Relatives and Tell Them What I Really Think Of Them” stage — neither of which are likely to give you the sense of peace you are looking for.

Leaving the room to make a drink, however, especially at the holidays, is a culturally sanctioned escape from playing Pictionary. “I’m just going to make a drink; go ahead and start without me,” is a tacitly accepted Holiday Get Out of Jail Free Card.

There are two approaches to the Escape Cocktail:

Fast and Easy: Get into the kitchen, make a simple drink, drink it, and get back out to the living room without spending too much of your rapidly diminishing social capital.

Slow and Complicated: Make something that will involve so much time and effort that nobody will be tempted to help you, and at the same time everyone will pretty much avoid and then forget about you altogether.

Thanksgiving Cocktail No. 1 – Fast and Easy: The Jack-In-The-Box

2 oz. Calvados, AppleJack or other apple brandy

2 oz. Pineapple juice

2 dashes bitters (I measured this out and two dashes = about 25 drops)

Combine ingredients over ice and shake thoughtfully. Don’t smash the ice up this time.

Strain into a martini glass.

The Jack-In-The-Box is a classic cocktail from the 1970s. It is different enough from what you are used to drinking to be interesting, but not so different as to be threatening. You don’t need threatening. Not right now.

Your experience drinking a Jack-In-The-Box will be highly subjective, depending on what you’ve been snacking on. If you’ve been eating something sweet, this will taste a little … off. If you’ve been eating something salty on the other hand, you will need one hand free to make a chef’s kiss gesture upon drinking it.

For those of us who are also from the ’70s, the JIB goes spectacularly well with homemade Chex Mix, or as we called it in my youth, Nuts & Bolts (see box).

Thanksgiving Cocktail No. 2 – Slow and Complicated: The Cranberry Cobra

½ oz. lemon juice

¾ oz. jalapeño rum (see below)

1½ blisteringly cold vodka

1 oz. cranberry syrup (see below)

½ oz. 100 percent cranberry juice

1 bottle Fever Tree Aromatic Tonic

Shake everything but the tonic over ice, as vigorously as you see fit.

Pour into a tall Collins glass, over more ice.

Top with tonic and stir gently.

This is a Thanksgiving riff on a cocktail called a Cobra Verde, which is frankly delicious, but pretty summery. The Midori that gives the original drink its verde has been replaced with cranberry syrup and cranberry juice. Tasty-But-Pricey Mexican pepper liqueur has been replaced with homemade jalapeño rum.

Is it delicious? Yes. Is it Thanksgiving-colored? Yup. How long will it keep you in the kitchen? Anywhere from 20 minutes to four days.

Cranberry Syrup

1 part sugar

1 part 100-percent cranberry juice – NOT cranberry juice cocktail

Bring both ingredients to a boil in a small saucepan and cook until the sugar dissolves completely — about two minutes.

Actually that’s it. You will probably want to let it cool before actually using it in a cocktail.

So, right now, if you are a thoughtful reader, you are asking why you can’t just use cranberry juice and simple syrup in the Cranberry Cobra and skip the syrup making altogether.

Seven words for you — Apple. Pie. Ala. Mode. With. Cranberry. Syrup.

Jalapeño Rum. Photo by John Fladd.

Jalapeño Rum

1 liter bottom-shelf white rum

4-5 jalapeños, roughly chopped.

Combine peppers and rum in a wide-mouthed airtight jar. Store someplace cool and dry.

Let it macerate for up to a week, but taste it after three days.

Shake twice a day, which gives you a convenient week-long excuse to leave a room. “Oh, sorry — I have to go shake the rum.”

When the rum is at the right level of flavor and heat for you, filter it through a coffee filter, bottle and label.

According to the website for the Tasty-But-Pricey Mexican pepper liqueur, they combine specially grown-in-the-moonlight ancho peppers and “pure cane spirits,” which sounds like white rum to me. Why bottom-shelf? Any subtle rum flavors will be blown out by the Angry Jalapeño Brothers.

This rum is absolutely delightful and will revolutionize your bloody marys.

1970s Era Nuts & Bolts
½ cup salted butter (1 stick)
2 Tablespoons full-sodium soy sauce
1¼ teaspoons seasoned salt
¼ teaspoon garlic salt (If there was any way to cram more salt into this, we didn’t know about it in the ’70s.)
2¾ cups Corn Chex
2¾ cups Rice Chex
2¾ cups Wheat Chex
1½ cups cocktail peanuts (Oh, wait – apparently there is a way.)
1½ cups sesame sticks
 
Preheat oven to 275 degrees F.
Melt butter in a shallow pan. Stir in soy sauce, seasoned salt and garlic salt.
Add cereal, peanuts and sesame sticks. Mix until all pieces are coated.
Place on a shallow baking pan with sides.
Bake for 40 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes.
“Wait,” I hear you saying, “what about the pretzels?
Funny you should ask.
I have a theory about pretzels; it’s part of my Grand Unified Snack Theory. Take a handful of pretzels. They’re fine. They aren’t exciting, but there’s nothing particularly wrong with them, either. Now, put them in a snack mix. They immediately become the worst thing in that snack mix. Sesame sticks, on the other hand, immediately become the best part of a snack mix. It’s a mystery of science.

Featured photo: Happy Thanksgiving. Courtesy photo.

In the kitchen with Melinda Sergi

Melinda Sergi of Concord is the owner of The Cannoli Stop Cafe & Bakery (239 Loudon Road, Concord, 224-9706, find them on Facebook), which opened in its current location in January after being in business for nearly two years a mile down the road. In addition to featuring a full pastry case of cheesecakes, cupcakes, chocolate-dipped Oreos and more than 30 types of homemade cannoli fillings, the shop has expanded its offerings since reopening to include subs, calzone turnovers, soups, pastas and other homemade dinners to go. All cannolis are made fresh to order — you can simply choose a small or large-sized shell, then pick your fillings and toppings. Fillings run the gamut from traditional and chocolate chip to caramel, blueberry, pumpkin and cotton candy.

What is your must-have kitchen item?
I use rubber spatulas for everything. We have piles of them.

What would you have for your last meal?
I’d probably say just a slice of pizza. I love pizza with sausage and onions.

What is your favorite local restaurant?
Vinnie’s Pizza in Concord.

What celebrity would you like to see ordering from your shop?
Sandra Bullock.

What is your favorite thing on your menu?
The cannolis top everything. I love the orange zest flavor and the chocolate-dipped shell. We’ve had orange zest from the beginning.

What is the biggest food trend in New Hampshire right now?
Takeout is the big thing right now, [like] subs, sandwiches, pizza, that kind of stuff.

What is your favorite thing to cook at home?
I love to make a full meal for the family, like a shepherd’s pie or a turkey dinner.

Photo courtesy of the Cannoli Stop Cafe & Bakery.

Chocolate-dipped Oreos
From the kitchen of Melinda Sergi of The Cannoli Stop Cafe & Bakery
1½ pounds chocolate of choice (milk, dark or white)
1 bag of Oreos (any flavor)
Toppings like sprinkles, coconut shavings or chopped candies (optional)
Melt chocolate using a double boiler and dip in Oreo flavor of choice. While chocolate is still wet, add any optional toppings. One and a half pounds of chocolate yields about 30 Oreos, which make great dessert trays for events.

Featured Photo: Melinda Sergi

When life gives you lemons, bake cookies

Salem’s Fabrizia Spirits launches line of limoncello-infused baked goods

Fabrizia Spirits Baking Co. Photos by Mark Feldman.

When Fabrizia Spirits co-owner Phil Mastroianni started to look ahead to what is normally a quiet winter season for the Salem limoncello producer, he turned to his younger brother Nick with an ambitious idea.
“We’ve been cooking and baking with our limoncello for years,” he said. “When we first started Fabrizia 11 years ago, we would do tastings at some of the liquor stores … and I would bake a limoncello cake and give out samples of it. So I said to Nick that we should start a baking company with our limoncello, and from there it didn’t take too much convincing for him.”
The Fabrizia Lemon Baking Co., which launched on Nov. 5, will feature a full selection of baked goods infused with Fabrizia limoncello that will be introduced over time. The company started with Italian limoncello cookies made from a family recipe, followed by limoncello whoopie pies. More lemon-flavored goodies like cakes and biscotti are expected to be added soon.
Utilizing space the company had recently acquired during a production expansion, Fabrizia added a commercial oven and received a food service license from the Town of Salem.
The cookies are baked fresh every day with all-natural ingredients, including real cane sugar, butter, eggs and lemon zest from freshly squeezed Sicilian lemons. The alcohol from the limoncello that’s used is baked off, making the cookies suitable for consumption of all ages, according to Mastroianni. They come in packages of six, each one weighing individually just over three ounces, and are available for online ordering and shipping.
“We wanted it to be kind of a luxury treat item and not just another run-of-the-mill cookie,” he said. “People really like the crispy exterior and the soft inside. … The lemon zest also makes it unique. When you’re able to use fresh lemon zest, it makes a great difference.”
Shortly after debuting the cookies, Fabrizia introduced lemon whoopie pies. Those feature a lemon cake with the limoncello worked right into the batter, while the cream filling is made from a combination of confectioner’s sugar, marshmallow and finely chopped lemon zest. Each ¼-pound whoopie pie is wrapped individually and can last frozen for up to a year.
By early December, Mastroianni said, the company expects to roll out limoncello biscotti integrated with almonds, a recipe inspired by the two brothers’ grandmother. The baked goods add to Fabrizia’s growing product line, which includes multiple types of limoncello flavors and ready-to-drink canned limoncello-infused cocktails.
From each order placed on Fabrizia’s new baking website, $1 will be donated to Feeding America, a nationwide network of more than 200 food banks across the country.

Fabrizia Lemon Baking Co.
Visit fabrizialemonbakingcompany.com, find them on Facebook and Instagram @fabrizialemonbakingco or call 458-1745 to purchase products, which include limoncello cookies, whoopie pies and other infused baked goods.

Featured photo: Fabrizia Spirits Baking Co. Photos by Mark Feldman.

The Weekly Dish 20/11/26

News from the local food scene

• Support local brews: Granite State craft breweries will once again observe Small Brewery Sunday on Sunday, Nov. 29. The day was created by the Brewers Association as a way to encourage beer lovers to celebrate and support locally owned breweries, brewpubs and taprooms, according to a press release. The Association is inviting breweries everywhere, including those in New Hampshire, to share Small Brewery Sunday on their social media channels using the hashtags #SmallBrewerySunday and #SeekTheSeal. In 2019 the craft brewing industry contributed $82.9 billion to the U.S. economy, but amid the pandemic sales have been down about 22 percent in the third quarter of 2020, according to the release. The New Hampshire Brewers Association is also continuing its NH Pint Days fundraiser through Wednesday, Dec. 2, featuring limited-edition collectible 16-ounce pint glasses available at more than 40 participating breweries in the state. Visit smallbrewerysunday.com.

• Emergency order violations: Three New Hampshire eateries were each fined $500 for not complying with coronavirus emergency orders, according to violation letters issued this week by the state Attorney General’s office. Checkmate Pizza in Concord, Simply Delicious Baking Co. in Bedford and What a Bagel in Nashua all received notices of civil penalties for alleged violations of Emergency Order No. 52, including not requiring customer service staff to wear masks or face-coverings when directly interacting with customers, according to a press release. Each establishment, which received multiple warnings to follow the order, has until Nov. 30 to pay the fine.

• Turkey Drive fundraiser: The Bedford Knights of Columbus, along with members of St. Elizabeth Seton Catholic Church in Bedford, joined forces to raise $10,808 during their annual Turkey Drive to benefit the New Hampshire Food Bank, a program of Catholic Charities New Hampshire, according to a press release. Since donating a few turkeys more than 10 years ago, the Bedford Knights of Columbus’s initiative to support the food bank has grown immensely, raising more than $123,000 over the last decade to help meet holiday food needs in the state. “Partnerships like this are critical in helping us feed our neighbors experiencing hunger,” New Hampshire Food Bank executive director Eileen Groll Liponis said in a statement. As a result of increased demand, the Food Bank expects to continue increasing its food distribution statewide, according to the release.

Dealing with deer

Fences, repellent and other deer deterrents

Winter is near, and for most of us so are the deer. They need extra food now, to get ready for winter, and some of what they eat — green leaves and grasses — is not readily available. So they are eating evergreen plants like yew, arborvitae and rhododendrons in our yards. There are steps you can take to help save your shrubs.

What can you do? You’ve probably heard the solution, but might not like it: an eight-foot deer fence around the perimeter of your property. Even then you might get an occasional Olympic deer that can sail over it. But generally deer are kept out by such a fence.

You don’t have to have a steel fence — lightweight plastic fencing will work, too. And you can use poles to support the fencing, straight young tree trunks you cut yourself from the back forty. And you don’t have to fence your entire property. You could put up temporary fencing just for the winter around a tree or shrub that is particularly attractive to deer that has been browsed in the past.

Recently I helped set up barriers around a pair of large yew shrubs. The shrubs are about six feet tall and wide, and in the past they have been stripped bare by deer. I got four eight-foot hardwood stakes and drove them into the ground around each shrub. I needed a stepladder and a three-pound sledge to do it.

The widest burlap we could buy was 44 inches wide, so my wife Cindy sewed two strips together to make an extra-wide band. We draped the cloth over the stakes, and stapled the cloth to the stakes all the way to the ground. We did not cover the top of the shrub, just the sides, so snow will fall through and not weigh down the cloth. It worked well last year — the poor deer went hungry.

What else? There are numerous repellents that work to a greater or lesser degree. I’ve had great luck using little garlic clips that I get from Gardener’s Supply Co. Each has a clothespin type clip to attach it to a shrub, and has a little cylinder filled with garlic oil. When you poke the device with a tool they provide, it releases the odors for up to six months. I use two per shrub, or more for bigger things or more attractive deer food.

Coyote urine is sold as a deer repellent, too. It is sold with one-ounce plastic bottles that have holes in the sides, a hanger on top and a cotton ball in the bottom. Dribble a little of their magic potion on the cotton, and hang it in a tree. Of course, you can also just bring your dog around the property and let him mark trees and shrubs. Some people hang bars of Irish Spring soap to discourage deer.

There are numerous sprays, too. Bobbex, Deer Away, Liquid Fence and Plantskydd are some of the most commonly sold varieties. Most use rotten eggs, garlic, or fish oils. You might not want to spray your plants the day of a garden party, but most odors disappear to us after a few days. If deer pressure is high, you might want to alternate which one you use.

Deer are creatures of habit. If they know you have good browse, they will come. If they think you have a pet coyote, they will stay away. No dog? Get dog hair from your local pet groomer. Some people hang sachets containing human hair or bars of Irish Spring soap out in their yard to repel the deer.

There are ways to scare deer away, too, but most take some effort to set up. You could install a motion detector attached to a radio with an all-talk radio format. When the deer arrive, Rush Limbaugh comes on and scares them away, I suppose. I’ve seen motion detectors that attach to a hose and send out spray when deer are detected. That only works in summer, obviously.

In areas of high deer population, gardeners sometimes choose their plants based on their appeal to deer. People, Places and Plants magazine (now, sadly, out of business) asked its readers to rate plants eaten by deer. They published the results in Issue No. 45 (2004). Here is some of what they said: Seldom eaten shrubs include boxwood, dogwoods, forsythia and spirea. Occasionally eaten shrubs include blueberry, hydrangeas, lilacs, summersweet clethra and viburnums.

Trees rarely pruned by deer include birch and ginkgo. Their survey listed occasionally eaten trees as Japanese maple, pear, pine, magnolia, spruce, willow and crabapple. I raised an eyebrow when I saw crabapple, as I frequently see apple trees that have been browsed by deer. Crabapples, I assume, would be the same, but please let me know if I’m wrong.

In areas with lots of deer, it makes sense to plant perennials that deer love near the house, and those eschewed by deer farther away. So hostas and tulips, loved by deer, should be right near the house. The survey found flowers usually eaten include lilies, daylilies, hollyhocks, black-eyed Susans, and asters. Scented things like lavender, artemisia and oregano are generally of little interest, and those seldom nibbled include balloon flower, bleeding heart, astilbe, foxgloves, columbine, peonies, Russian sage, yarrow and monkshood.

For a more complete list of deer preferences, you may want to consult a book on the issue. One I like is Outwitting Deer by Bill Adler Jr. But remember, if you have a plant that is dear to you, put a fence around it — there is almost nothing a hungry deer won’t eat.

Featured Photo: Burlap can be used to keep deer away from tasty shrubs. Courtesy photo.

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