Cooking Across 4 Generations

A week and a half after returning from Hong kong our next wine dinner was due to happen. What a hectic week and a half that was too. Busy in the restaurant while still having El Circo in the auditorium was a bit stressful.

For this dinner we were showcasing the wines of Brokenwood. Originally starting from vineyards in the Hunter Valley (think iconic Graveyard Shiraz and the great value Cricket Pitch wines), Brokenwood now has wines from many of Australia’s best vineyard locations (for example McLaren Vale, Beechworth, Cowra). Once again 5 courses with 7 wines. 7 wines because we have to have something with canapes and we also like to enliven the evening a bit with a Mystery wine game.

Rene and I  were very fortunate to be invited to have a tour of Brokenwood winery at Pokolbin in the Hunter Valley which was a nice end to our holiday. We also had dinner at what must be one of the best restaurants in the Hunter Valley, Muse, which is located at Hungerford Hill cellar door. While we took a few photos at the winery we weren’t able to get any at Muse due to low lighting levels. But if you get to Pokolbin you HAVE to go to Muse!! So here are a few photos from Brokenwood winery….

 

So the  Brokenwood dinner went well, apart from a few slightly undercooked wings. The salmon coulibiac was good even though it came out huge. Learnt a lesson there I can tell you, should have cut the salmon down the length which would have made smaller strips which would have been more manageable and given better portion sizes Everyone loved the chocolate pave with the drunken cherries.All the flavours of  a blackforest but with out the cake. Unfortunately no photo of the mini  drumstick, we cleared too quickly.

Our menu was:

With canapes Brokenwood Semillon 2010 Hunter Valley

Lightly spiced broth with duck wontons

Brokenwood Pinot Gris 2010 Beechworth

Mini drumstick with spanner crab farce, coated in Japanese breadcrumbs, pickled cucumber and Yuzu mayonnaise

Brokenwood Chardonnay 2009 Beechworth/Cowra

Salmon coulibiac with lighly smoked tomato beurre blanc

Brokenwood Pinot Noir 2009 Beechworth

Braised beef cheeks, forest mushroom ragout and Roman gnocchi

Brokenwood Hunter Shiraz 2009 Hunter Valley 

Pave of chocolate, drunken cherry compote, chantilly cream on chocolate biscuit crumbs

Brokenwood late picked Semillon Cowra

In two weeks time we have our next dinner which is Wirra Wirra with Negociants Australia. Looking forward to doing this as we are doing a few things that my family has at Christmas with a twist. But you will have to wait for the post on the dinner to find out what we serve. And I will make sure I take more photos.

Thanks for droppiong by for a look! V