Dining in The Wine Cellar

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Tonight was a special treat. Five of us dined in the Wine Cellar Room at Delius, www.deliusrestaurant.com . This room is private and has a window that looks out into the kitchen so you can see all the activities going on. 10 courses which is a lot of food even with the small portions. Half way through I had reached my saturation point.

I let the others pick out the wines for this evening. As long as they went well with the food is all I cared about and they did a good job or doing that.

We were seated at 7:15 and left at 10:45. No one trying to push you out for the next diner.

We started off with an appetizer plate which had, Spanish white anchovies, Kalmata olives, a very good Hummus, tomato salsa for bruschetta, endive, feta cheese and toast points. Only missing for me was a pate.

Next was a seared Ahi which was exceptional in flavor.

Scallop with carmelized shallots, fried mushrooms, carrot puree and chive oil.

Salad was very thinly sliced gold and red beets with micro arugula, goat cheese and a balsamic reduction.

Soup was a roasted garlic and carmelized onion. Very good. I have had this soup before and always enjoyed it

The two whites wines we had with these dishes were a 2007 Xavier Frissant, Val de Loire, Sancerre and a 2009 Vionta Albarino. Very good pairings and the wines were very reasonable.

This is where I hit the wall.

Entree was roasted duck breast with potato gnocchi with raspberry gastric. Had one bite and asked Fred to box it up for me. As always the duck was excellent.

We were then served a pink grapefruit sorbet to clean the palate.

Main course was a beef filet with mushrooms, onions, green beans , parsnip puree and a red wine reduction . Again one bite and boxed to go.

The red wine we chose for this part of dinner was an 2008 Miner, Garys Vineyard, Pinot Noir. A good choice.

A cheese plate appeared with a soft brie type cheese, manchengo a blue cheese, crackers and grapes. I did not have any at all as dessert was next and I needed to save room for it. But the plate got cleaned up by the others.

Dessert was a Filbert (Hazelnut) gelato over a thin slice of a decadent chocolate cake.

All the food was top quality as it usually is at Delius. Had good service with Fred and Phillipe. Company was good along with the wines. It was a very enjoyable evening. Could not have asked for anything more. Will have to do this again.