Thursday Sips & Nibbles

I am back again with a new edition of Thursday Sips & Nibbles, my regular column where I highlight some interesting wine and food items that are upcoming. **********************************************************
1) Seeking a great wine bargain at a local restaurant? Starting July 1, and running through September 2, you can find such excellent bargains at Troquet's annual Wine Cellar Clearance Sale. Every night during this period, owner Chris Campbell will offer approximately four dozen vintage bottles of wine at deep discounts. These bottles are the last of their kind in his cellar and once they're gone, they're gone. Bottles are for enjoying with dinner, not takeaway.

I've been to this wine cellar during previous years and Troquet offers true bargains and rare finds. You will find plenty of older wines, at frankly dirt-cheap prices, from all over the world. You'll never know what you might find, but I'm sure you will find something intriguing.

Troquet recommends diners make reservations, as this event is quite popular, so please call 617-695-9463 to book your dinner.

2) On Wednesday, July 9, from 7:30pm-11pm, Beat Hôtel will transport diners to Greece during its first Greek Beat Fest, a night featuring specialty Mediterranean-inspired menu items and music from Synavlis.

In addition to the regular menu, guests can enjoy Greek-inspired food specials with a Beat Hôtel twist. Executive Chef Ignacio Lopez will be serving up dishes like mezze platters, shrimp with walnut garlic sauce, roast leg of lamb with oregano potatoes & Greek salad, and seared ahi tuna with warm cauliflower salad, lemon & olives that pair nicely with any Beat Hôtel libation. Signature cocktails to indulge in include the Soursop Fresca, concocted of Bluecoat gin, soursop nectar, agave, lime, and soda ($12) and the Electric Sidecar, made with Clear Creek apple brandy and Fruit Lab orange organic liqueur ($12).

The food isn’t the only thing going Greek on the 9th. Guests will be able to enjoy authentic Greek music from Synavlis. Hailing from Greece, Synavlis is a talented quintet that performs traditional Greek music from Asia Minor and the Islands of Chios, Lesvos and Naxos.

For more information or to make a reservation call 617-499-0001.

3) July presents a special British theme at The Cheese Shop of Concord, with several exclusive, in-store happenings worthy of note:

Tuesday, July 1
A special British Cheddar, aged especially for The Cheese Shop is available for just a few weeks.
--Cheese buyer Brie Hurd journeyed to the U.K. in April, and met with 3rd-generation cheesemaker Jamie Montgomery of Montgomery’s Cheddar. After tasting the cheese in various stages of aging, on the North Cadbury Manor Farm where it is made, Brie was invited to select one wheel exclusively for The Cheese Shop of Concord. This exceptional cheddar was made in June 2013, aged to a “round and balanced” 11 months, then shipped to Concord. Montgomery’s is “the epitome of traditional, handmade, unpasteurized Somerset cheddar” and is carried only by the top cheesemongers in the U.S. It has won over 15 worldwide cheese competitions since 1996. Muslin-wrapped and aged on wooden shelves for up to 18 months, it has a flavor some have called “like the caramelized crust of a Sunday roast.” The store will sell it by the pound until it runs out.

Thursday, July 3
British Cheesemakers invade The Cheese Shop. Meet them & enjoy free sampling all day.
--Two respected cheesemakers will be visiting on this date. Stop by to meet these artisans, and enjoy samples of their award-winning wares all afternoon.
Sam Holden, HAFOD Welch Organic Cheddar
Holden makes small batch cheddar cheese from raw, Ayshire cow milk, known for its high butterfat content. The cows graze in meadows near the Aeron River in West Wales, on a farm certified organic since1973. This distinctive cheese reveals its Swiss recipe origins in its deep nutty flavor, and it has a distinctive mold rind.
Joe Schneider, STICHELTON Blue
Joe is one of six cheesemakers at the Welbeck Estate at the tip of Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire, “the English blues heartland,” and a growing region for artisanal foods. Not a true Stilton because it is made with unpasteurized milk, the cheese’s name means “style of the village.”

Saturday, July 19
English Beers & Ciders Sampled from 1pm-5:30pm
The staff of The Cheese Shop’s promises to pour some eye-opening beers, ales and ciders from England.

Throughout July
Blackboard Special: Ploughman's Lunch Sandwich
--The term ploughman’s lunch has been used in England since the 1300s. It refers to a fast and filling cold platter, often served with ale. Cheese Shop will offer a traditional version on pumpernickel with English cheddar, ham, chutney, hard boiled eggs and pickled vegetables.

Tasting By The Moon

Some people would advise you not to drink your wine today as they believe it is not going to taste as good as it should. Why? Because today is a "root" day.

Should wine reviewers taste wine only on certain days, days which allegedly are more optimum for the flavor of the wine? While touring Bordeaux, should Robert Parker skip tasting on specific days to get a more accurate view of wine quality? Should Gary Vaynerchuk only tape his videos on particular days so as allow the wines he tastes to show their best? Is the only difference between an 89 point wine and a 90 wine point just the fact they are tasted on different days?

In short, should wine reviewers follow the beliefs of a German great-grandmother who spends much of her time gardening?

There are some who would answer affirmatively to that last question. They include Tesco and Marks & Spencer, two major supermarket chains in Britain. Between the two of them, they sell about one-third of all the wine drunk in Britain. So they wield some power in the wine industry in Britian. But who is this influential German woman and why is anyone listening to her?

Maria Thun is the name of this influential woman and she is considered an authority on biodynamic agriculture. Besides being an author of books on gardening and biodynamics, she also created the “Biodynamic Sowing and Planting Calendar,” which was first published back in the 1962. (Though there are some references claiming it was published in the late 1950s.) The calendar is used by farmers and gardeners to determine the best days for various agricultural and planting activities.

Yet the calendar has another purpose, to indicate the optimum days to drink wine! Based on the rhythms and configurations of the moon, planets and constellations, days are categorized as "fruit," "flower," "leaf" or "root" days. Wine is supposed to taste best, with the most flavor, on fruit days, followed by flower, leaf and root days. So, you should only drink wine on fruit and flower days and not on leaf or root days. It is not so much that wines will taste horrible on leaf or root days, it is more that they will not show their true potential. They will be more subdued, less flavorful, less expressive. In addition, on fruit days, the fruit flavors of a wine will be most evident while on flower days, the wine will show more floral and perfume notes.

This is simply an extention of the biodynamic concept, which is embraced by numerous wineries and farmers. You certainly hear plenty about biodynamic farming and wine making, yet you hear almost nothing about biodynamic wine tasting. But you may soon hear more and more about this unusual concept.

As mentioned above, Tesco and Marks & Spencer, both adhere to the beliefs of Thun on biodynamic wine tasting. For at least a few years, they have been using her calendar to determine the optimum time for when they should allow wine reviewers to taste their wines. But it is only recently that this has been made public. They claim there is a clear difference in the taste of wines dependent on the day you drink them.

There may be other wine stores and/or wineries that also are relying on Thun's calendar for tastings, but who have not come forward yet to make that fact known.

I am very skeptical of biodynamics, so I don't lend much credence to this belief that the moon and stars affects the taste of wine. Yet it might make for an interesting test.

Have any of you tested this concept? Do you know anyone else who is relying on biodynamic wine tasting? What do you think about this concept?