Best of ComBQ

At our last ComBQ, it was suggested that we do a “Best of ComBQ” as there have been some really great dishes that people wanted to have again. Steve and Melanie were nice enough to set up an online poll so everyone could vote on their favourites. After the votes were in the menu for the evening looked like this –

Roasted Tomato Soup with Parmesan Crisps by Melanie

Almond crusted Goat Cheese salad with a Raspberry/Poppy seed dressing by Mark

Chicken Quesadillas by Mick

Cuban Pulled Pork Sandwiches by Alex

The first course was Melanie’s awesome Roasted Tomato Soup with Parmesan Crisps. Melanie (and Steve) paired this with a 2009 Beringer’s Sauvignon Blanc. When I first heard the pairing I was a little doubtful about it but was surprised how good a pairing this was. I would have leaned towards a Merlot as a pairing here but the crispness of the Sauvignon Blanc made a great contrasting pairing to the richness of the soup.

The second course was mine and I did Almond crusted Goat Cheese salad with a Raspberry/Poppy seed dressing. I picked a 2007 Selbach-Oster Spätlese Riesling as my pairing. It caught a few people off guard on how sweet this wine was especially after just having a dry Sauvignon Blanc. The sweetness was needed however as anything less sweet wouldn’t have held up to the sweetness of the Raspberry dressing. It was a very good pairing with the salad and the eight of us killed two bottles of it with very little difficulty.

The third course was Mick’s famous Chicken Quesadillas. He (and Amy) picked a 2007 Gnarly Head Old Vines Zinfandel as the pairing to go with this course. Both the Chicken Quesadillas and the wine pairing were up to Mick’s usual standard of excellence.

 

The last course ended up actually being the only new dish for the night as Alex couldn’t find the original recipe he did Cuban grilled pork tenderloin sandwiches instead. He picked a 2008 Kim Crawford Pinot Noir as his pairing with the dish. This whole course was the biggest surprise of the evening for both the wine and the food. First off his original recipe was very good but the new recipe he found was even better; I can’t believe how damn good these sandwiches were. Secondly, Pinot Noir wouldn’t have been my first (Red Zin), second (Sangiovese) or even third (Rioja) choice of grape to pair with this recipe but it truly was a stellar pairing and I’d be shocked if any of the pairings I was thinking of would have been better.

For dessert we picked up a selection of baked goodies, chocolate and chocolate based cookies. For anyone having the baked goods I had a bottle of2006 Henry of Pelham Late Harvest to go with them and a 2005 Altair to pair with the chocolate. Both wines were very good.

I would like to thank Melanie, Steve, Alex, Zdenka, Mick and Amy for coming and for all the wonderful food and wine. I really enjoyed our Best of ComBQ but considering how great every ComBQ is with this group, I think every ComBQ is the ‘Best of ComBQ’ and am already looking for the next one.

Cheers!

Mark