Food Everybody Likes: Would you like dinner with your drink?

I love coffeehouses and wineries. Whenever I'm in a coffeehouse, I get the urge to pontificate about history, politics, religion, philosophy, literature...it's like just smelling the coffee in the air automatically makes one more intellectual. Or trying to be intellectual, anyways! In a winery, looking out at a gorgeous view of the vineyard, I can just relax, take a deep breath, and enjoy the finer things in life.

However, coffeehouses and wineries don't always have incredible food. Here are a couple of places that combine the best of both worlds: amazing food and special drinks. These restaurants are definitely not places where you can just order water with your meal.

Uncorked Wine Bar, West Hartford: http://www.uncorkedct.com/

The food (and drink): This is high cuisine at its finest. For dinner, I had the parmesan encrusted organic French chicken. It was arranged beautifully on the plate, the chicken on top of a delicious polenta and topped with glazed carrots. Around all of it was a gravy-like veloute sauce. The chicken was cooked perfectly, and my favorite part of it was the parmesan skin. I felt like this was a dish you would find on Next Food Network Star or Chopped! Kevin had the roast leg of duck, with haricots vert (fancy small green beans). The wine was paired well with the meals as well. My favorite tasting was a red wine from Italy. I always used to like white wine better than red, but I think that's because I usually have local (CT and Finger Lakes, NY) wines. White wines are more suited for cold regions like these. Trying the Italian red wine, though, made me think that I had just never had a good enough red wine before! Finally, we ended the meal with a decadent dessert: chocolate lava cake. It was like a brownie, but more moist and filled in the middle with molten chocolate sauce--a chocoholic's dream.

The vibe: It was a small, fairly intimate restaurant, with a chic bar area and a sit-down restaurant area. It was modern and "cool," and I was very impressed by the attentive service. This restaurant is definitely a classy addition to West Hartford Center.

The value: Although expensive, we got a great deal from LivingSocial. In addition, most of the wine tastings range from $2-$10 for one oz., so you can try a few different wines at affordable prices.

Go for: A romantic date!


Tisane Euro-Asian Cafe, Hartford: www.mytisane.com/

The food (and drinks): This cafe features a fusion of Asian and European flavors, as well as an extensive and exotic tea and coffee list. They have a variety of flatbreads, burgers, and noodle bowls. I've had their Pad Thai, which is perhaps not as authentic as at a Thai restaurant, but just as tasty. The real stars here, though, are the drinks. They have all kinds of tea, easily organized and classified on their menu: black, white, green, oolong, rooibos, herbal. The tea comes in your own personal teapot and stays warm for your whole meal. My favorite is the spicy masala chai.

The vibe: Very bohemian and artsy.

The value: The tea is a great value, and the meals are less expensive than most regular restaurants in the area but more expensive than usual for cafes. Tisane is part of Taste of Hartford so go this week if you can!

Go for: Meetup with friends or downtime on your own with a good book

In Season: The 2011 Connecticut Wine Festival

Sorry for the lack of posts for the past couple of days--I had a very busy but fun weekend with friends and I spent most of Sunday at the Connecticut Wine Festival in Goshen!

For $25 at the door, we got access to wine samples from wineries all across the state, as well as specialty food samples, entertainment, craft vendors, a wine appreciation class, and a commemorative wine glass and tote bag.

Here are some of the highlights from the day:

- Taylor Brooke Winery (Woodstock) had my favorite wine of the fair, a Summer Peach Riesling. Rieslings and Gewurztraminers are my favorite white wines because they are so fresh, light, and sweet--but not too sweet or too acidic. I can only describe this wine by saying that it tasted like summer!

- Hopkins Vineyard (Warren) was someplace Natalie and I had to visit, for obvious reasons. My favorite wine there was the Sachem's Picnic, a semi-sweet red with raspberry, blackberry, and plum flavors. The name is very apt, and I enjoyed that this wine was fruity and not as dry as red wine can often be.

- Land of Nod Winery (East Canaan) first caught my eye because of its fanciful name, but what really got my attention was their delighful 2009 Rose, which was refreshing and subtle after tasting the other stronger wines.

Of course, wine is best appreciated at the vineyards themselves, where you can enjoy stunning views, beautiful architecture (such as the entirely wood bathrooms at Cassidy Hill Vineyard in Coventry, where I also savored a sweet strawberry wine called Summer Breeze), and more personalized attention. However, the benefit of a wine festival is that you can taste a little bit of everything and determine which wineries you would like to visit.

In addition, we got a helpful lesson from wine expert Laureen Guerriero of Wine Time Uncorked in West Hartford. "Wine is art in a bottle," I remember her saying. "And your own taste is the standard." Basically, you like the wine you like and don't like the wine you don't like. It's all about you and your taste. Her motto is "Have fun and taste mindfully!" Part of tasting mindfully is knowing how to taste. Here's what I learned.

Follow the 5 "S's":

1. See: Tilt the glass at a 45 degree angle over a white sheet of paper and look for the clarity, intensity, and color of the wine.

2. Swirl to release the aroma.

3. Smell: Put your nose deep into the glass and try to discern the condition, intensity, and aroma of the wine. The aroma characteristics are fruit, floral, spice, vegetal, and oak.

Common aromas with whites: Citrus, pear, peach, tropical fruits, honeysuckle, cinnamon, and vanilla
Common aromas with reds: berry, black cherry, plum, rose petal, cloves, cedar, earth

4. Sip: The fun part! Try to determine what aromas you taste as well as smell. Also try to figure out the wine's sweetness, acidity, tannin (for reds only), and body (mouthfeel).

5. Summarize and savor: Give your opinion on the quality of the wine and think about food pairings. And, of course, enjoy it!

Finally, because this is a food blog, I have to mention a really cool food product at the fair. Peace Tree Desserts is an organic, sustainable bakery. Their vendor featured cajeta caramel, a high quality Mexican caramel sauce that came in flavors like cinnamon, apple jack, and curry. At $13-18 a jar, it's not cheap, but it is the best caramel I've ever tasted.

Next up: Taste of Hartford!