Team Zaarly will be setting sail in McCovey Cove on August 9th to watch the San Francisco Giants take on the Pittsburgh Pirates. We’re on a boat! Want to join us? Here’s how:
Fulfill your way to glory: Score a spot on our #ZaarlyBoat!
When I found out this month is National BBQ Month I was so excited to share my BBQ passion! There is nothing more relaxing to me than to fire up my #Webber , light a fire in my backyard fireplace, pour myself a glass of wine and cook away!
My family convinced my years ago to enter a local BBQ cooking contest at the Napa City Fair know as “Dad Can Cook”. We had such a good time I entered the contest the 3 years they had it, took home two 2nd place finishes and a third place finish. I decided since it is National BBQ month I would share the first dish I cooked that earned me a #Webber BBQ, a nice little cash prize and one heck of a good time!
I call it my Sushi Napa Valley Style and thought I would share it with you!
Here’s what you will need:
- Salmon - 8 ounces - Wasabi
- Japanese short-grain rice - Pickled Ginger
- Rice vinegar - Sugar, Salt, Garlic Salt
- Mayo - Asparagus
- Canned Grape Leaves - Avocado
- BBQ Smoking Chips & either real Charcoal or Briquettes
- Bottle of your favorite big red wine
- Soy Sauce
Start with some prep work:
First off removed 8 to 10 Grape leaves from the jar, place them in a large bowl, then take your bottle of wine and pour enough over the leaves to marinate over night. I know we are making Sushi not Dolma, its okay it works trust me!
Get another large bowl or plastic bucket pour your smoking chips in your container and pour some more wine over your chips. Allow your chips to soak for 30 minutes, and then pour off excess wine. It okay if you don’t use you’re good wine for this, its up to you, my take is, you use quality you get quality.
Now to make you’re Sushi Rice:
Here is a recipe for making sushi rice. Japanese rice is short grain rice and gets sticky when it is cooked. Long grain rice isn’t proper for sushi because it is drier and doesn’t stick together.
Ingredients:
Preparation:
After washing and soaking Japanese rice, cook and let it steam. Prepare sushi vinegar (sushi-zu) by mixing rice vinegar, sugar, and salt in a sauce pan. Put the pan on low heat and heat until the sugar dissolves. Cool the vinegar mixture. Spread the hot steamed rice into a large plate or a large bowl. Please use a non-metallic bowl to prevent any interaction with rice vinegar. It’s best to use a wooden bowl called sushi-oke. Sprinkle the vinegar mixture over the rice and fold the rice by shamoji (rice spatula) quickly. Be careful not to smash the rice. To cool and remove the moisture of the rice well, use a fan as you mix sushi rice. This will give sushi rice a shiny look. It’s best to use sushi rice right away.
Makes 4-6 servings.
Now that your rice is ready we need to prep our Avocado & Asparagus. Take an avocado and cut it in half separate, remove the seed then cut narrow wedges to use as filler in you sushi. Next we need to roast our asparagus by placing them on a baking sheet, coating them with some olive oil, and a little salt and pepper, then bake in the oven at 400 degrees for 10 minutes. Once these are done set them aside on a on a plate or paper towel for later.
Time to prep the Salmon! Melt a half a stick of butter in a bowl. Once melted add a half teaspoon of garlic salt. Place the Salmon on a small baking sheet, pre made foil pan or make your own foil pan. Place the Salmon skin down on the sheet, then baste with the garlic salt butter, and then pour the remainder of the butter in the pan. Before the butter sets up, coat the top with Mayonnaise like your frosting a cake, but not as heavy.
Okay now for the relaxing part! Place your Charcoal on each side of your BBQ leaving the middle open. Place your smoking chips on your charcoal, then place your grate so you can drop chips in as you go. Place your baking sheet with your Salmon in the middle of your BBQ to allow the smoke to roll over the top for more smoke flavor.
Check to make sure your coals are burning, then close the lid on the BBQ, turn your vents down to half way open to allow for deeper smoking, continue to check to make sure fire continues to burn as you go, don’t allow to coals to flame, you want them to burn hot and slow. Cook for 30 minutes, open lid and check to see if any bubbles are under the mayo, which indicates the heat has penetrated the meat, if so remove and set aside to cool.
That’s it! Now your ready to start Rockin and Rollin! You will need either a snazzy Ginsu Sushi make like I snagged at our City Fair, or some variation.
http://www.amazon.com/Master-Ultimate-Beginner-Japanese-Cooking/dp/B0017743XA
http://www.amazon.com/Sushi-Chef-Making-Kit/dp/B000H241DS/ref=pd_sim_k_5
Now with all your ingredients ready we can start to assemble and roll our Sushi! Lay a grape leaf flat in your Sushi maker, then spread a layer of rice a quarter inch thick on top of the leaf. Then find the middle portion of the leaf and dollop a line of mayonnaise down the middle of the leaf, then lay a generous line of smoked Salmon down the middle, the lay Avocado on top of the Salmon, then lay a spear of Asparagus on top of the Avocado. Depending on the type of Sushi roller you have your now read to roll! Once you have your roll completed, you want to make sure you have a very sharp knife to be able to cut your pieces clean and not tear them.
The last piece of the puzzle is to make your Wasabi. You have many options; there is wasabi powder which you just add a little water and you can roll Wasabi Balls to plate for a nice presentation. There is pre-done Wasabi in tubes which you could use to make designs for plating. Then you must have some pickled Ginger to top off your presentation.
Hope you have as much fun as I do! Make sure to have lots of wine to sip on, and good company to visit with as you play around with becoming your own Sushi Chef! Douzo Meshiagare! (Bon Appetit)
Cellars of Sonoma Panel Tasting Trahan & Olabisi Wines Napa California We at Cellars of Sonoma have a passion for small production hand crafted wines. We are constantly in search of those hidden gems out there that most people have never heard of. We have tasted many small production wines over the last 3 years, some being world class wines, others being very good wines, and others being works in progress. Our original tasting panel consists of 6 very passionate wine enthusiasts. The palate range runs the gamut, with a typical every day consumer palate, to a very seasoned and trained wine professional palate. The other panelists range all parts in between, some having stronger palates in white varietals and others stronger in the red varietals. We have had lots of experience making and drinking wines, and are passionate about what we do. We decided in the quest for finding those world class hand crafted small production wine, that we would offer up the opportunity for our tasting panel to taste through any vintners who might want to put their wines to the test. Immediately when we tweeted and posted in Facebook about this opportunity our friend Chris Foster the tasting room manager at the Trahan Winery & Olabisi Winery Tasting Room said he would love if we would put their wines to the test, and this is a summary for our tasting of these wines. So for our first tasting I stopped by the Trahan Winery & Olabisi Winery Tasting Room and picked up a bottle of the 2006 Trahan Suisun Valley Petite Verdot and a bottle of the recently released 2008 Olabisi Ceja Vineyard Carneros Chardonnay. Our tasting event took place at Cellars of Sonoma and our findings are as follows: First up for our tasting was the recently yet released 2008 Olabisi Ceja Vineyard Carneros Chardonnay We are big fans of the wines coming out of the Carneros area and we are friends with the Ceja family and know they have a reputation for farming some amazing Chardonnay fruit in Carneros, so we were looking forward to tasting this wine. Because at the time of our tasting, this was a yet to be released wine, we did not have access to a tasting spec sheet, however Chris did say they produced approximately 300 cases, that it is 100% varietal, with the same program as the 2007. Online notes indicates this includes 12 months in French oak, 20% new, full malolactic fermentation with no stirring or racking, he indicated the kicker being that it fermented completely dry. The color is a rich and golden, reflective of their program and time in the barrel. This is a big buttery Chardonnay, with notes of caramel, pineapple and lemon, with a finish that was long, full and rich. We all agreed that this wine will likely get better with aging. We also agreed that this wine will be appealing to those who like a buttery Chardonnay. We like the winemakers story, and the packaging is great, we like the O logo for lots of branding opportunities. 2006 Trahan Suisun Valley Petite Verdot The fruit is from the Ledgewood Vineyard in Suisun Valley and is 100% Petite Verdot. Winemaker Chuck Custodio Some of us on the panel are big fans of Petit Verdot and Cab Franc, and so we were excited at the opportunity to taste this wine. Our group was impressed with this beautiful Deep dark inky color wine. We were not surprised at the dark color since the fruit comes from the Suisun Valley area. This is a dry, windy and very warm in late summer and early fall months, which we felt results we figured would result in thick grape skins, giving the wine that rich dark color. It is very rich and dense. It smells of green leafy vegetables, but also notes of caramel, soft chocolate and a hint of brown sugar are noted. Everyone agreed big tannins in the mouth, however not over the top for a 100% varietal. It hits the palate with big chocolate flavors, along with cherries, dark fruit, and an earthiness on the finish. Several in the panel were pleasantly surprised with this wine, were curious to taste prior vintages and felt this would be well received in the market. If you find yourself in downtown Napa definitely stop by their tasting room at 
Open 7 days Noon to 5:30 pm 707.257.7477
DISCLAIMER: All opinions expressed on this site are my own and in no way are influenced by anyone or anything else. Please use these blogs and reviews as a guide to help formulate your own opinions.
Wine spectator’s 100-point scale
See Also About Our Tastings Tasting Format Wine Spectator Taster Profiles Special Designations Wine Spectator tasters review wines on the following 100-point scale:
* 95-100 Classic: a great wine
* 90-94 Outstanding: a wine of superior character and style
* 85-89 Very good: a wine with special qualities
* 80-84 Good: a solid, well-made wine
* 75-79 Mediocre: a drinkable wine that may have minor flaws
* 50-74 Not recommended
Finished wines, reviewed from bottle in blind tastings, are given a single score. A score given as a range (e.g., 90-94) indicates a preliminary score, usually based on a barrel tasting of an unfinished wine.
As of March 2008, we have switched to rolling four-point spreads for unfinished wines. For example, one wine may be scored 85-88, another 87-90, another 89-92. We believe this will better reflect the subtle differences between wines, and give our readers better information for their buying decisions. Most barrel tastings are blind; when they are not blind, this is specifically noted.
It’s amazing that the question of whether Calistoga vintners could use the name of the town on their wine labels would be the subject of a six-year battle. That battle was resolved Thursday with a decision by the federal Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau — known as TTB — to grant an American Viticultural Area appellation to Calistoga.
But not before four senators and several congressmen weighed in, the California Legislature passed a resolution, lobbying trips shuttled vintners from Napa to Washington, D.C., and Rep. Mike Thompson, D- St. Helena, sat down with high-ranking officials in the Treasury Department.That Calistoga is a distinct wine area under the federal definition was never in doubt. Winegrapes have been grown in Calistoga for more than a century. At the foot of Mount St. Helena, its volcanic soils are unusual.
What was the question, then? The market implications of granting the AVA status.The outcome of Thursday’s decision is bad for Calistoga Cellars, an 8,500-case winery with a tasting room in Calistoga, but with wine made from grapes grown elsewhere. That winery now has three choices: Change the name of the business, start using Calistoga grapes or somehow escalate the battle after what appears to be a binding decision.
The outcome for other Calistoga wineries is beneficial. They are free to use the word Calistoga on their labels.Wine aficionados who are drawn to the cabernets of Diamond Mountain or Howell Mountain or Rutherford can tell whether they are getting what they covet just by looking at the bottle. Now, Calistoga vintners have the same advantage as their neighbors in nearby appellations.
Whether or not this makes a difference to the average wine consumer, the TTB decision is a win for consumers in general. With specialty products like gourmet cheeses and wine, information about the place of origin and the methods of production are important to high-end purveyors and to their clientele.
What’s next for Calistoga Cellars? It’s best option may be to source some grapes from Calistoga and keep the name for that line of wines, then invent other labels for its other products. That way it gets the benefit of its established name while conforming with the TTB ruling.
Meanwhile, after six years and much sturm and drang, the obvious is now reflected in the Federal Register: They grow winegrapes in Calistoga
Dpn’t know is this really works? will have to give it a try! if it works great party trick! CHEERS!
This is ingenious and it will definitely come in handy: How To Open a Wine Bottle Without a Corkscrew. Watch also other methods using a shoe or a phone book here.
