Maderia Wine Dinner at Delius

Saturday, June 14, 2014

Wine Country in Signal Hill, www.thewinecountry.com and Delius restaurant, www.deliusrestaurant.com, hosted a dinner tonight with dishes paired with Maderia wines and a two Portuguese red wines. I was looking forward to this unusual pairing of food and wine.. I sat with Vince the local wine distributor rep, Randy and Dale Kemmner and one of their staff from the Wine Country and Ruy, the Winery rep from Portugal. This was another sold out dinner for Delius.

Patrick Gallardo their Sous Chef has been put in charge of all the menus for these wine dinners and he is doing an excellent job. He started out slow a couple of years ago but quickly learned from his mistakes and has really turned out to be a gem for Delius. Not overly complicated dishes like Daniel used to do. Patrick does clean, simple and fabulous flavors.

We started out with what tuned out to be my absolute favorite dish of the night. Fig, Pistachio and Orange Zest Crusted Halibut, with Sercial Bur Blanc and Rainbow Carrots.The crust was so light and delicate, almost like a crystalized sugar and the halibut was cooked to perfection. A 5 Year Old Blandy's Sercial Maderia was paired with this dish and it was a perfect pairing.

Louise made Shallot bread for tonight. Used to be the house standard but it is not only for special occasions.. This bread is so good. I ate two pieces becuse I just couldn't say no.

Second course was Duck Consomme with Carmelized Onions and Beach Mushrooms. Consomme had excellent flavor and the onions were in a canelle shape. They were so sweet. I was a toss up which was sweeter the onions or the 10 Year Old Blandy's Verdelho Maderia. Again a great pairing.

Third course was set in front of us.  Braised Boneless Beef Shortribs, Portobello Mushroom Risotto and Sauteed Black Kale.  The meat was tender and loaded with flavor.The risotto was perfect but I was not a fan of the black kale. It seemed to be more bitter than green kale. Two red wines were served with this dish. A 2009 Prats and Symington Prazo de Roriz and a 2011 Prats and Symington Post Scriptum. Both dark and inky and loaded with flavor. The Post Scriptum having a bigger fruit forward taste and the Roriz having a more subtle balanced finish.. People do not give enough respect to Portugese wines. They have some very good wines, both white and reds and the prices are still reasonable.

A tray of Artisan Cheese was served. All cheeses came form the Cheese Connection in Belmont Shore. Brillat Savarin,  a soft triple cream, from Normandy. Prima Donna, a Gruyere Style, Holland. Midnight Moon, aged goat cheese from Monterey, CA and a Point Reyes Blue cheese from San Francisco. Also on the plate were figs soaked in Maderia, poached pears, nuts and crackers. a 15 Year Old Blandy's Bual Maderia and a 10 Year Old Blandy's Malmsey Maderia were paired with the cheese plate.

Dinner was finished with a Sticky Toffee Pudding and a canelle of house made ice cream. This dinner was a bargain at $79. It was hard for me to envision pairing Maderia with dinner food dishes but I was so surprised. Again another great dinner at Delius.