My nose in a glass

The Wine

Last night we had friends and their family over to celebrate Mona's birthday. Like the exquisite guests that they are, they brought fruit and a bottle of wine. I always love having Ido's mother and step-father over because not only are they fascinating company and always good for stimulating discussion.....they also know a LOT about fine food. His step-father especially has a nose for wine that never ceases to amaze me. Any bottle they bring is usually going to be fabulous (as well as something I've never had before) but last night they outdid themselves.

I'm not usually a fan of French wine. I find it too earthy, too peaty and sediment heavy. Imagine a beautiful french countryside, and you are leaning against a rough wooden fencepost and you hear a cork gently ease free of a bottle. Oh, you say, bring me some of that fine French wine! Inhale the fine crisp air and feel the weathered wood and the grass under your legs and somewhere on the edge of your vision someone is gathering mushrooms into an old woven basket. A glass is handed to you, and you swirl and sip and realize that this wasn't exactly what you had in mind. It's gritty, and you can't get over that taste of loam, and you suspect they filtered your wine through a sack filled with dirt.

Now pop that fantasy. That's the old Sarah's French wine experience. Last night I sat at the dinner table and I stuck as much of my face as I could into a wineglass and just inhaled the intense smell of the wine they brought. It. Was. Glorious. There was sediment in there but I didn't give a damn. I absorbed as much of it as I could directly through my pores and then drank the rest in short tiny sips to make it last longer, never taking my nose out of that glass. I may never have French wine again, since I don't think anything can ever compare. It was the best of any wine I've ever had.

Charlie has mastered cooking with aromatics

Another thing that smelled good this weekend was a pot of tom kha gai soup that Charlie made on Saturday night. It's a Thai chicken soup with coconut milk and lots of kaffir lime leaves. Charlie has adapted his recipe to be sort of a whole-pot bouquet garni of ingredients that he sautees, then cooks with the coconut milk, then strains to make a velvety liquid. Once that infusion is ready, he adds in the chicken and mushrooms. You get all of the flavor with none of the lemongrass shards caught between your teeth. We like this soup so much, in fact, that we have a kaffir lime tree growing in our kitchen so that we can use the leaves.

What did not smell good today: the stain on the floor underside of the aviary. It smelled bad, but once those boards are dry I can flip them over, screw them down, and have a proper floor. Then it's time to build the walls.

What looked pretty today: this red bush. I have no idea what it is, but in the summer it has deep aubergine leaves and in the fall they turn a flaming scarlet.