On Monday evening I had a holiday celebration at YES Gallery that was so beautiful and abundant that it's still being spoken about and will be for a long time. A wonderful Chef, Greg Norrish, helped me onsite and also in the planning, and Joel Liscio, the Artist and Sommelier who has work in the gallery and who I have done other art and food and wine pairing events with in the past, brought some wonderful selections to share. A vineyard in Santa Barbara that I had shared wines for an art gallery opening and events in 2020 that had to be postponed allowed me to serve their wonderful wine selections for this event, and it was such a beautiful joy to finally be able to share the wonderful flavors of the J. Wilkes Pinot Noir and Viognier with guests at the gallery. Chef Greg Norrish had discussed the menu with me over a meal at a restaurant in Hoboken, Zero Otto Uno, where I was planning that some of the menu items be provided from. I had White Truffles from Urbani that I wanted to use in the menu that was served at the gallery and Chef Sonny at Zero Otto Uno had told me that whatever I wanted to use them with he'd be happy to help provide. It's such a joy to work with Chefs like these two, who not only create delicious food but have the ability to do it so well and are such great help in their expertise and experience. Once I had begun the discussion with them and shared the things that I liked and thought would be good for the menu, they took it from there and created a menu that was memorable and special. There were a few things I had to pick up and one item that I prepared, but other than that they took care of everything with such skill and excellence and good will that the experience I had of hosting was a pleasure.
The idea of the evening was loosely based on pairing Artists with food and wine and their own inspiration that included other art forms, and one Artist read his favorite poem that several of his paintings were titled from. The menu started off with individual antipasti of prosciutto wrapped asparagus which was the one item I prepared, and fresh and smoked mozzarella and sweet cherry peppers stuffed with cream cheese from Fiori's House of Quality served in cups from a variety of vintage snack plates that I had begun to collect when Joel and I had discussed continuing our art, wine and food pairings after a very special Chef we had been collaborating with on them for the Love & Plenty project in the fall of 2020 and early 2021 had left the area for some other projects he was working on. Originally we were thinking of continuing the events in Artists' studios, and I had been trying to think of some way to serve food in an environment where people might not be able to have a full sit down dinner and the snack plates seemed a fun way to do that while keeping with the vintage theme of things that I always enjoy. Following the antipasti which looked so lovely in the variety of cups was a steak tartare on fried wonton shells topped with freshly shaved white truffles. That second course and the one following it of focaccia bites made with straciatella bufala and roasted mushrooms topped with freshly shaved white truffles were creations of Chef Greg Norrish using focaccia and straciatella from Zero Otto Uno and mushrooms he had roasted and seasoned, and they were delightful. The next course was a cacio e pepe made with cavatelli, cheese, cream and pepper from Zero Otto Uno topped with freshly shaved white truffles, and the final dessert course was the first ever White Truffle Panettone from Urbani served with a selection of truffles from Milène Jardine Chocolatier. The room smelled of truffles and was filled with joy and creativity, art and life, and with Chefs like Chef Greg Norrish and Chef Sonny to work with, the food was not only wonderful, the experience of it was a delight.
No comments:
Post a Comment