The Autumn Wine Pairing Dinner (BYO)
The menu runs French (gougères, gratin, brown butter, a jus) through a pantry that’s shiitake and kabocha and napa cabbage, which is to say an American pantry, whatever anyone tells you. Everything gets passed, so you’re handing the gratin to a stranger by the second course.
The Menu
- Black-pepper gougères
- Shiitake and sage sausage, chicken and duck, with cider-shallot mustard jus
- Potato and kabocha squash gratin
- Roasted carrots, brown butter, thyme, lemon
- Napa cabbage, apple and parsley salad
- Dessert
What to Bring
BYOB. Three of these dishes were built with a wine already in mind, so if you want the easy version, here it is.
The sausage is the mushroom-and-herb dish, and mushrooms and sage don’t want weight, they want acid and something leafy running underneath. Pinot Noir does it. So does Gamay, and cru Beaujolais does it better than most people expect. Cabernet Franc if you like a little green in the glass.
Apple shows up twice, in the mustard jus and again in the cabbage salad, which puts Riesling and Chenin Blanc squarely in play. Off-dry is not a mistake here.
The gratin is the Chardonnay slot, and you can take that anywhere you want — Chablis for tension, Mâcon or something restrained out of Sonoma if you’d rather it sink into the potatoes and disappear.
Bring one bottle or bring three. This is a decent night to open the thing that’s been sitting in your rack because you never had the right dinner for it.
Seats
Two per member. Bring a partner, a friend, or somebody you’ve been meaning to feed. There aren’t many.