Picnic at Mount Eden Vineyards

Friday Group Annual Picnic at Mount Eden Vineyards, 2010: an annual affair that always brings great food, wine and friendships together. Even though we were missing a few members and spouses, this year brought together some haute cuisine and special wines.

We started with Einar’s Gravlax and who better to make it than a Norwegian! It was delicious--moist, flavorful and sensual! It was served with 2007 Mount Eden Chardonnay, Saratoga Cuvée…needless to say, a perfect accompaniment.

We then had a Chilled Asparagus Soup that Martin prepared using leeks, spinach and asparagus….the dish was so good that I asked for a recipe and you’re curious, click on the soup to get the recipe. He didn’t create the “timbale” part but the soup alone was divine! What enhanced this dish was the wine he served with it. There is a perception that no wine goes well with asparagus EXCEPT this little known wine from Austria: Grüner Veltliner. I had never heard of this wine variety (it’s NOT “varie-tal”) but it does pair perfectly with asparagus! K&L sells it for around $10 so that part is nice too!

Next was a totally decadent dish prepared by JP (also a guest blogger), Scallops with Uni Hollendaise and Salmon Roe. The photo does not do this dish justice! If you love uni (from sea urchins), you’ll love this dish because the sauce just shouts out fresh ocean flavors, silkened by the buttery hollandaise. He placed a small piece of the uni on top with a sprinkling of jeweled salmon roe. He then served it with 1996 AND 1990 Louis Latour Corton Charlemagnes (my favorite white burgundies!)….

In addition to the wines that people brought to go with their dishes, Jeffrey and Ellie graciously shared some of Mount Eden's wines with us: Mount Eden 2006 Chardonnay Estate, and Mount Eden 2002 Chardonnay Estate in magnum. We drank it all, of course!

We then had our main course which was Wild Duck Legs Confit. I provided the wild duck legs (which were very small!) I received from a hunter friend of ours and Jeffrey prepared them over two days. The leg was served over some chopped greens direct from Jeffrey and Ellie’s garden with a side of Rice and Lentils with Caramelized Onions, topped with crispy onions. The Rice and Lentil dish was from the cookbook, Zov, that our cookbook club used two years ago. With the wild duck we had a Caymus 1982 Pinot Noir Special Selection, Santa Cruz Mountains Vineyard 1982 Pinot Noir, and the Mount Eden 2002 Pinot Noir Estate in magnum. The older pinots were interesting, still had some flavor, and were of lower alcohol with the Caymus at 12.5.

We had a cheese plate that had an assortment of French, Italian and California cheeses (sorry, I can’t remember what they were called! If you remember, please add the info in the "comments" section below) served with 1990 Chateau Baron de Pichon-Longueville and 1990 Chateau Pichon Longueville, Comtesse De Lalande. What great pedigrees in cheeses and wines!

We than had the dessert that I described in a previous post. Orange Layer Cake with Orange Caramel Crème Cheese. I served it the Thomas Kellar’s Vanilla Ice Cream that I enhanced with orange zest…sort of a frozen crème anglaise. It was a hit with everyone but me...I just didn’t like the cake part of it. The dessert Bordeaux wine was a delicious Chateau Clos Haut-Peyraguey 2001 Sauterne


I think we have just raised the bar on our picnics!

I have included some photos of the members of the Friday Group because they are all so photogenic and everyone was so happy and full of fun on this "perfect-day-for-a-picnic" event!






If you'd like to see more photos (unedited) you can view them on Shutterfly. Just click on the word "Shutterfly." Shutterfly photos were taken by Einar.