From Cask to Kisses

[neadods]

So, a posse of us headed up to Linganore Winery for their "Cask to Kisses" chocolate and wine tasting.

It wasn't quite what I expected, which is a bit surprising because I didn't know what to expect. For $5, they gave us a box with 7 different pieces of chocolate - a Hershey's kiss, a pear truffle from a local chocolatier, an Italian Baci, uncredited raspberry cream and 77% cocoa, and a couple of other local candymakers chipped in a chocolate-covered cherries and a coffee truffle. They also gave us a sheet of paper listing all the wines, in a chart that had an * under each chocolate the wines would be good with.

And then we got a taste of the entire selection.

I passed on several or I would have passed out even at a mouthful apiece, and now that I'm home, I notice that I'd marked one of the wines that I then forgot to get a bottle of (White Raven "a soft crisp off dry white with natural fruity aromas found in Pinot Grigio.") I wanted to try it as a poaching sauce. I'll grab it when I go up in June, when I'll stock up on my year's supply of May wine.

I did pick up another bottle of their mead, which is also an excellent poaching sauce, and a bottle of the blackberry. I also picked up their cookbook, which is going to be a little bit dangerous, because there are some lovely ideas there. (I'm afraid that bottle of plum wine won't be around for next Thanksgiving, Signe - they've got a recipe for plum wine jelly. But I can try to get another one in June.)

One of the things discussed on the way up is taking root in my head - resurrecting the old $600 of Therapy and a Free Afghan knitting book (I have even more ideas now) and doing a cookbook tentatively titled "The Electronic Gourmet" - recipes from a standardized shopping list (so no teaspoon of something you never need again) that take less than 15 minutes of your time and are effortlessly finished in a variety of kitchen appliances. Probably with a heavy reliance on the crock pot and the steamer, on account of the former being inexpensive and the latter being useful in an electric steamer, an electric rice maker, or in a steamer on top of the stove.

Comments

[suze2000.livejournal.com]

OMG I need both of those books. Put them on a Kindle and I'd be even happier. :)

[neadods.livejournal.com]

600/Therapy should probably come with a kit, though, as I'm planning on using the idea of colored stitchmarkers keyed to a colored row counter to "program" a lace pattern.

OTOH, the Kindle version could probably come with instructions on how to make your own.

[mechturtle.livejournal.com]

doing a cookbook tentatively titled "The Electronic Gourmet"

I would SO buy this!

[fyrdrakken]

So I reread a scattering of the essays from Free-Range Knitter over the weekend when I should have been working on my Olympic socks, and one of the ones I looked at was the yarnharlot talking about the friend in her local knitting group who seemed to bring herself out of a lengthy depressive episode by knitting a literal mile of garter stitch in the form of a large log-cabin blanket. (Caveats being made that the Harlot was clear that the friend didn't actually literally knit her way out of depression -- just that it gave her a measurable accomplishment to focus on, visible progress to measure, a reason to get out of bed on those days when that was about all she could make herself do.)