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Archive for March 2016

Hill Party

Mar30

It’s time for Hedonist buddy Chevy’s annual birthday party — although this time, as he’s getting married next week, it’s a combined bday and pre-wedding party.

Located at Chevy and Seb’s parent’s house on Venus. Actually La Crescenta, which is FAR out there, but gorgeous.

Not a bad view!

This party was BYOB wine, and pot luck food with some people bringing pre-prepared stuff and some of us cooking!

I made my “famous” Dan Dan Mein — super hot with lots of authentic Szechuan chilies.

Fried onions from… Outback I think. haha. Pretty tasty though.

Falafel and humus and eggplant.

Roast Chinese pork!

Roast goat from Boa (there was a goat dinner there 48 hours before).

Chef Avi’s Indian goat curry.

Rice of course.

Yummy fried chicken.

Vegetables. Like Curry Cauliflower.

Hmmm. Green.

Poke.

Seb holding a live lobster.

Yarom chewing on the goat head!

And lots of others having fun.

What’s a party without chips?

Or sausage.

Ceviche.

Crab mushrooms.

Ron’s Veal Milanese. He spent hours making this totally from scratch and it won the dish of the night — although I hold out for my Dan Dan 🙂

Live lobsters!

Chef Adam killed them and basted them with…

Lavender butter.

Then they were grilled. Next to them are marinated venison and buffalo steaks!

Oh and Mark brought Prime Rib!

I probably missed a brunch of stuff too. And then there were the desserts.

Like red velvet cake.

Here is the happy couple, Chevy and Mary with a bit of their wedding cake (in advance).

This party kept on going. Not only were there about 80 bottles of wine! Yeah, 80, but there was a Napa Cab blind tasting with 19 bottles. I tried, but petered out at about number 7 or 8 because this was WAY too much cab for my “delicate” pallet.

More good times.

I’m not going to bother showing all the wines. Way, way too many. I’ll just show some of the cabs and the like.         This is the blind line up after the reveal.

And here are some, but not nearly ALL of the other wines. This was A LOT of wine. Much was too New World or young for me, but some were great.

Related posts:

  1. Epic Ocean Party 2015
  2. Birthday Party, Hedonist Style
  3. House Party from Laos
  4. Yamashiro – Castle on the Hill
  5. Dinner Party – It all starts with Cheese
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: birthday, Dan Dan Mein, hedonists, La Crescenta, Wine

Mountain Eats – Campo

Mar28

Restaurant: Campo

Location:6201 Minaret Rd Suite 240, Mammoth Lakes, CA 93546. (760) 934-0669

Date: January 17 & March 20, 2016

Cuisine: Italian

Rating: decent, for Mammoth

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Mammoth Lakes isn’t exactly a culinary capital, so we twice went to:

Campo, the Village’s designated Italian.

Campo calls itself Rustic Italian. Well, I guess that’s reasonable. More Rustic Contemporary Italian American, but who’s being specific.

Bread and olive oil / balsamic.

This is a composite of two dinners, both times I brought Brunello. Forgot to photo the first one.

From my cellar: 2004 Tenuta le Potazzine Brunello di Montalcino Riserva. VM 93. Deep ruby-red. Knockout nose combines red cherry, smoky plum, minerals and licorice. Enters creamy, fleshy and smooth, with decadently rich red and black fruit flavors, but turns more austere towards the back. Finishes with above-average complexity and depth, featuring ultra-smooth tannins and an enticing mineral persistence. Lacks the length for an even higher score, but this very serious wine only needs a few years in the cellar to show all it’s got. This is the first Riserva ever made by this estate.

agavin: I got this bottle (and a couple cases of others) at the winery. It was bricking slightly but in a really good spot.

Charcuterie. Meats!

Butternut soup.

Simple Green Salad. White balsamic vinaigrette.

Kale salad. Various extras.

Wood fired cauliflower. Calabrian chilies. garlic. Not bad.
 Beet Salad. roasted baby beets, butternut squash, rosemary goat cheese, chile oil. Strange neon glow to the beets!

Special with burrata and prosciutto and very salty crackers. Super yummy though.
 Pizza!

Kid’s pasta.

Special Pappardelle with orange and duck. A little sweet but quite good.

TAGLIATELLE wild boar bolognese, grana padano. A decent, but slightly dry version of this classic dish. The meat needed more flavor somehow.

Special seafood risotto with shrimp and scallop.

Steak and potatoes. This is Mammoth.

A very unattractive split of a root beer float.

Caramel budino. These are always great. Love it.

Campo is great for Mammoth and sort of decent by LA Italian standards. It’s got a good menu and execution is decent. Some dishes are tasty and some are a tad flat. Service is overwhelmed. Both times we were there — granted with big parties — they couldn’t really handle it and there were issues. They were nice though. Mammoth servers usually are. They just couldn’t get it all right / timed / etc.

For more dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Mountain Time Machine
  2. Quick Eats: Divino
  3. Quick Eats – Palmeri
  4. Quick Eats: Osteria Latini 2
  5. Quick Eats: Caffe Delfini
By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Campo, Italian cuisine, Mammoth Lakes, pasta, Pizza

Quick Eats – Pho 2000

Mar25

Restaurant: Pho 2000

Location: 215 N Western Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90004. (323) 461-5845

Date: March 18 & July 5, 2016

Cuisine: Vietnamese Pho

Rating: A lot like Vietnam

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I was in Korea Town and looking for a quick lunch.

And I drove by this, so figured I’d give it a try.

This is a super quick eat, so I just photoed what I ordered from the large selection of Pho and fried rice. Menu is in Korean too. lol.

They have all the condiments.

And bring you the fresh ones, like onions.

And the lime and cilantro and basil.
 House Special. Meat Ball, rare steak, Brisket, tendon, tripe, onion, cilantro, green onion. Good broth. It pretty much tasted like straight Pho I had in Vietnam. I liked all the meat except the tripe and maybe the tendon. I find that dipping the noodles in the hoisin is delicious too. I’m all about hoisin.

IMG_5407
Pho Seafood Combo. Pretty much the combined meat and seafood works. Doesn’t look so different does it?

People say Pho 2000 isn’t very authentic. I’m no serious judge, and I ordered only one thing. It was pretty tasty though.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Or to check out some “real” Vietnamese dining (in Vietnam), my “Eating Vietnam” report.

Related posts:

  1. Viet Noodle Bar
  2. Quick Eats – Da Jeong
  3. Quick Eats – Il Pastaio
  4. Quick Eats: Tofu Ya
  5. Quick Eats – Gladstones by the Sea
By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Pho, Pho 2000, Vietnamese cuisine

Inotheke – Modern Greek

Mar23

Restaurant: Inotheke

Location: 606 Broadway #101, Santa Monica, CA 90401. 310) 458-3366

Date: March 19 & November 11, 2016

Cuisine: Modern Greek

Rating: Good flavors

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I’m always on the lookup for new local restaurants, plus I like Greek food, so I as excited to hear about modern Greek eatery Inotheke.

 Located right near the promenade on Broadway.

The menu is full of reinvented classics, but tuned toward sharing and small plates.

Likewise the interior is modern and clean, with only a touch of blue and white to remind us of the “theme.”

Tzatziki. I never eat Greek without ordering my favorite tangy yogurt. This version was pretty good. Tangy, garlicky, but not as thick as I like it.

The pita was grilled, soft, and greek style.

Oven Roasted Beet salad. Arugula, goat cheese, red onion, dill, lemon vinaigrette. Fairly typical, but still a tasty salad.

Spanakopitakia. Feta, kaseri, spinach, red pepper. Got to love fried pastry encrusted cheese!

Scallop tartare. Cucumber, lemon, olive, chili flakes. This had a good bit of dill too and was quite “Greek” in flavor. The scallops were nicely firm. Good stuff overall.

IMG_6194
Salmon “Exohiko”. (11/5/16) Filo Pastry, Eggplant, Zucchini, Capers. Basically salmon baked in a pastry!

Shrimp Saganaki. Tomato Sauce, feta, ouzo. A version of the classic greek dish. Sometimes in Greece it was cheesier and creamier, but this was solid. Lots of acid.

IMG_6197
Scallop Saganaki (11/5/16). Tomato, Feta, Ouzo, Scallions, Rice. On our second visit, Inotheke mixed up their Saganaki, venturing away from the classic shrimp to scallop (never seen that in Greece) and adding in some lovely rice underneath. The rice alone made this version better.
 Lamb & Orzo. Tomato, Parmesan. My favorite dish of the night. Basically like a lamb risotto or pasta. Nice texture from the orzo and appropriate lambiness from the soft meat, plus the cheese really worked.

IMG_6196
Moussaka. (11/5/16) Ground Beef, Eggplant, Zucchini, “Bechamel”. A nice version of one of my favorite Greek dishes. Lots of goopy Béchamel!

Overall I liked Inotheke and I’ll be back. Sometimes I like my Greek pretty “traditional” but this split a nice balance as they had many of traditional dishes, merely with updated plating (that’s a plus). Flavors were good and bright and I like the sharing format — plus it’s very convenient.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Petros Greek Feast
  2. Aestus – And the Modern Plate
  3. Parlez Vu Modern?
  4. Quick Eats: Taverna Tony
  5. More Modern Dim Sum
By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: California, Greek cuisine, lamb, Moussaka, Santa Monica, Small Plates, Tzatziki

Quick Eats – Da Jeong

Mar21

Restaurant: Da Jeong

Location: 3909 1/2 W Olympic Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90019. (323) 931-8900

Date: March 14, 2016

Cuisine: Korean

Rating: Great homestyle Korean

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Los Angeles is blessed with a huge Korea Town and an extensive library of Korean food.

Da Jeong is a home style place that’s famous (at least among my friends) for its Korean fried chicken. But somehow I’d never tried it.

Pretty much beer friendly food.

Like any good Korean place, Da Jeong comes with an array of banchan (small usually pickled dishes). This one was a spiced pickled cucumber.

Kimchee, the classic.

Greens and onions.

Bean sprouts.

Chewy radish and peppers, vaguely chewy and quite tasty.

Little “candied” fish. Sweet, spicy, and briney.

Seafood pancake. This omelet/pancake is served with a soy sauce-like sauce. It was full of green onions and all sorts of seafood goodness. Really quite excellent.

Soy sauce shrimp. Raw or marinated prawns soaked in soy sauce. You twist off the head and chomp. As we noted, this was an “advanced” dish. Not so hardcore as the raw crab, but hardcore enough.

Fried chicken. Had to get this of course. Very crispy, with a strong Asian salt and pepper in the batter. We found it a touch mysterious which part of the chicken we were getting under all that fry, and the cuts are different than classic American breast and thigh. I’m guessing it was mostly dark meat. It was pretty darn awesome though.

Hearty Korean Spicy Beef Stew. That standard red Korean sauce with beef and cabbage and green onions and other stuff. Certainly a hearty hot stew.
 Purple rice (rice with a bit of red bean).

I have to come back here with the Hedonists and a bigger gang and/or someone Korean. Food was very good and I could tell the ingredients were super fresh and the execution excellent. I don’t really know enough yet about Korean food to know how to order well, and with just the two of us we only got to try a few things — plus with portion sizes as they were we had WAY too much food.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Quick Eats: Tofu Ya
  2. Quick Eats: Sunnin
  3. Quick Eats – Mondo Taco
  4. Quick Eats: Chan Dara
  5. Quick Eats: Momed
By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Da Jeong, fried chicken, Korea-town, Korean cuisine

Kali on Melrose

Mar18

Restaurant: Kali [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]

Location: 5722 Melrose Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90038. (323) 871-4160

Date: March 16, 2016

Cuisine: New American French

Rating: Really good

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I’ve known Kevin Meehan for years as a private and popup chef and have had the pleasure to enjoy many a fine meal he’s put together. But this year he’s transitioned into the more stationary, and possibly more hectic restaurant world by opening up his own Melrose Ave restaurant!

Here he is in the attractive new space, exhausted at the end of a long busy dinner service.

With the opening of Kali Restaurant, Chef Kevin Meehan’s broad 23-year culinary career reaches its apex. At Kali, Meehan, whose deft hand was cultivated in Los Angeles’ most prestigious kitchens, joins forces with long-time friend and professional colleague, Drew Langley, previously the wine director at the iconic, Michelin-starred Providence.
For the 39-year-old Meehan, Kali represents the evolution of not just Kali Dining, his roving private dinner pop-up, but the rigorous years he spent refining his craft. The contemporary California restaurant blends the precision and hospitality of the white tablecloth kitchens where Meehan developed his culinary acumen, with the accessibility and ease of a local’s favorite neighborhood haunt.
Born and raised in Long Island, New York, Meehan’s initial foray in the industry was at a fried chicken joint when he was a teenager. While most would be turned off by working the fryer, Meehan was feeding an innate attraction to food, and, in the process, unearthing what would become a life-long love affair with the restaurant world. After graduating high school, Meehan enrolled in the esteemed Culinary Arts program at Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island, an education that he would test and sharpen on-the-line during an apprenticeship at the Michelin-starred L’alban Chambon under French Master Chef Dominique Michou, and, later, alongside Los Angeles’ finest chefs.
In 2000, Meehan drove cross country to assume a post at the celebrated L’Orangerie, then helmed by Chef Ludo Lefebvre. It was there that Meehan met Langley, who he would subsequently work with at the now late Bastide, where Meehan served as Chef de Cuisine, and, later, at Citrine. After Citrine’s closure in 2005, Meehan joined Patina Restaurant Group as Chef de Cuisine at Joachim Spichal’s seminal Patina restaurant in Downtown. During his three-year tenure, the restaurant received a Michelin Star for its fresh interpretation of French cuisine informed by seasonality, and Meehan was consequently promoted to Executive Chef of Café Pinot.
In 2012, Meehan parted ways with the prolific restaurant group to launch his passion project, Kali Dining. The underground operation quickly garnered critical attention for Meehan’s assertive, yet nuanced tasting menus that he prepared, dinner party-style, for Los Angeles top tastemakers, luminaries, and food enthusiasts. Kali the restaurant was birthed from the success of Kali Dining, and the passion that Meehan and co-owner Langley share for pushing the boundaries of the typical fine dining experience.

For Kali, Kevin partnered with Drew Langley.
While most known for his esteemed tenure as the Wine Director at the Michelin-starred Providence in Los Angeles, Drew Langley brings an extensive resume of experience to Kali Restaurant, a passion project born out of his 15-year friendship with Chef Kevin Meehan.
As Co-owner and Wine Director of the contemporary California restaurant near Hollywood’s iconic Paramount Pictures Studios, the 39-year-old’s near life-long matriculation in the food & beverage industry is fully realized. Kali blends the haute cuisine and hospitality of a fine dining destination with the accessibility of an everyday neighborhood haunt, and Langley’s concise, intelligent wine program is a reflection of the core philosophy that defines the restaurant.
Born and raised in a small town in south Maryland, Langley’s initial introduction to the industry was as a dishwasher at a local pizzeria at the age of 13. While his contemporaries found inspiration in the classroom, Langley was drawn to the rhythm and intensity of the restaurant world, acquiring a vast understanding of its inner workings through odd jobs that ran the gamut from line cook at regional chain Perkin’s to corporate trainer for Applebee’s openings to bar back at Solomon’s Pier, a seafood restaurant and nightclub.
In 1997, the then 20-year-old Langley leapt at an opportunity to relocate to Los Angeles, and stumbled into a position at Greenblatt’s, a beloved deli and wine shop in West Hollywood, that would ultimately pave the way for his future career. Langley furthered his three-year wine education at Greenblatt’s with a position at Dennis Overstreet’s Beverly Hills Wine Merchant, before joining the now-closed L’Orangerie in Beverly Hills as Sommelier in 2000. It was there that Langley crossed paths with Meehan, who he would subsequently work alongside at the late Bastide and Citrine.
After opening Bastide in 2002 as Commis Sommelier, and enjoying a stint as Wine Director at Citrine in 2003, Langley switched gears to lend support to entrepreneur and wine collector Jeff Smith for the launch of Carte Du Vin. His time at the local wine cellar management firm birthed and deepened relationships with prominent private collectors, relationships that inform his wine program at Kali today. In 2005, Langley joined the opening team at Providence, serving as Wine Director for Michael Cimarusti’s nationally-acclaimed seafood destination through 2015 when he left to prepare for Kali’s debut in early 2016.
An avid music enthusiast, when Langley is not refining his wine list with new finds or overseeing the day-to-day operations at Kali, the Koreatown resident can be found indulging in the local drum-and-bass culture.

This was a Foodie Club dinner, with just 6 of my regular dining intimates — and of course great wine.

1973 Perrier-Jouët Champagne Cuvée Fleur de Champagne. Agavin 93. Strong oxidative notes, but delightfully in balance with a terrific acidic backbone.

NV Krug Champagne Brut Grande Cuvée. This is the 1990-2006 disgorgement. The NV Grande Cuvée is absolutely stellar. This is one of the very best Grande Cuvées I can remember tasting. The flavors are bright, focused and beautifully delineated throughout, all of which make me think the wine will age well for many, many years. Lemon peel, white flowers, crisp pears, smoke and crushed rocks race across the palate in a vibrant, tense Champagne that epitomizes finesse.

Sous vide egg. Very close to straight egg with a little creme fraiche and rosemary. Super delicious and an awesome pairing with the old champagne.

From my cellar: 1985 Bouchard Père et Fils Chevalier-Montrachet. agavin 87. Kinda funky, especially at first, with strong petrol notes.

1986 Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars Chardonnay. agavin 95. Who would have thought, but this old Cal chard was gorgeous. Nutty, with an incredible white floral nose and a lot of round punch. Fairly Burgundian, although not as acidic.

Bass Crudo. citrus / olive / nasturtium. A fabulous crudo with really strong olive notes that really worked. That EVO drizzled around was amazing, very intense.

1970 Château Haut-Brion Blanc. 93 points. On the nose, ripe apricot, lapsang souchong, gasoline initially. An older dry palate with dried apricots, bitter orange, and faint pecan skin. This bottle was really singing with a crazy strong acidic backbone.

2003 Louis Latour Corton-Charlemagne. Burghound 91. Here too the nose has incorporated virtually all of the wood and offers elegant ripe and spicy green apple fruit aromas that complement the big, rich and very powerful flavors that are complex and massively long. Interestingly, the flavors seem almost heavy on the mid-palate yet there is good vibrancy to the finish that provides the necessary lift. This would merit a slightly higher score save for the noticeable finishing warmth.

agavin: super round and ripe without a lot of acid. Some botrytis on the finish, almost like honeysuckle.

Shrimp and potato agnolotti. A really nice pasta dish with strong harmonious flavors. Great sauce, nice like texture on the pasta, and very fresh little shrimp with no hint of fishiness.

From my cellar: 1975 Charles Noellat Vosne-Romanée. agavin 94. While this was a bit cloudy, and funky for a second, it blew off and possessed a ton of red fruits, cherries and strawberries and a really nice mature finish. Not a super refined Burg but in great shape.

1990 Domaine Rossignol Trapet Chapelle-Chambertin. 96 points. Considerable bricking and somewhat opaque; knew from the outset it was at least fifteen years old. The luxurious bouquet sings with the finest elements of great Burgundy! Sous-bois, earth, rose petals, charred cork, and hints of smoke, etc. The wine features brilliantly focused acidity, all the elements on the bouquet, and a mind-bending textural mouthfeel! Lasting finish marked by tremendous acidity and unbridled deliciousness!

Wheat berry Risotto. black garlic / toasted cheese. Looked all funny, but a really nice balance between the earthy risotto and the crunchy cheese.

1987 Bruno Giacosa Barbera d’Alba. agavin 93. Drinking great, age having smoothed out all the rough edges.

1952 Giacomo Borgogno & Figli Barolo. This was a weird one, some ancient 1952 Barolo “restored” at the domain with 2000 barolo. It tasted like a 1998! Very nebbiolo, with some maturity, but none of that old bricked character.

Aged Liberty Farms duck!

Duck breast with carrots in carrot jus. Just a really nice piece of aged duck with a very french bit of gaminess.

Whole Wheat Crackers. For the cheese below. Delicious. Like wheat thins and graham crackers blended.

Creamy Chevre. tangerine marmalade / whole wheat cracker. Small but delicious on the toasts.

1976 Maison Sichel Niersteiner Rehbach Riesling beerenauslese. agavin 94. Yummy sweet stuff.

1986 Château Filhot Comtesse Durieu de Lacarelle. Nicely mellowed.

Toasted Meringue Gelato. grated candied yolk. This tasted like sweet cream with a dusting of salty eggy goodness. It was mild, creamy, and absolutely stunning. I ate two.

Petite Fours.
 We had a few glasses for 6 people!

Overall, not only was this a great meal with great friend (and wine), but Kevin’s food was really bang up fabulous. He’s always been a very talented chef but it seems to me (and I’ll have to try more dishes — oh, poor me) that he’s really polished up the details. Perhaps it’s having his own kitchen, but execution was really on point for each dish. There are comfortable but slightly unusual flavor pairings — and they all worked — which gives a lively freshness to the cooking. His concept was Michelin food in a casual setting, and Kali really seems to be delivering.

Service was great. We felt like family.

Really great stuff. Bravo Kevin and Drew!

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Big Bottle Madness at Kali Dining
  2. Kali Cabernet
  3. Uni All the Way Down
  4. Pistola with a Bang
  5. Châteauneuf-du-Pape in the Sun
By: agavin
Comments (3)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Foodie Club, Kali

Tasty Duck X 4

Mar16

Restaurant: Tasty Duck [1, 2, 3, 4]

Location: 1039 E Valley Blvd. Ste B102. San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 572-3885

Date: February 28, 2015

Cuisine: Chinese

Rating: Great Duck!

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Tasty Duck is a regular spot with my Hedonist food and  wine club.

The interior is jammed and the turnover is high. There isn’t even a space inch to stand while waiting for a table as the serves need what little space there is to reach the tables. Although tonight being Sunday, the crowds died down by 8pm.

NV Billecart-Salmon Champagne Brut Rosé. VM 92. Pale orange. High-pitched red berry, orange zest and jasmine aromas, with suave mineral and smoky lees notes adding complexity. Spicy and precise on the palate, showing very good punch to its strawberry and bitter cherry flavors. Opens up smoothly with air and picks up a bitter rhubarb quality that lingers onto the long, tightly focused finish. This bottling showed more brawny character than many past renditions of this cuvée, but with no lack of vivacity.

The main event: Peking Duck. Not only was this delectable, with fantastic crispy skin and delicate meat, but it’s artfully arranged. We had two plates of these per table and it was a feeding frenzy!

Here are the traditional accompaniments, starting with excellent pancakes. One mystery question I must ask: why do Chinese restaurants insist on putting far too few pancakes and too little hoisin sauce on the table?

A pancake in the making. For some reason tonight the hoisin seemed saltier and less sweet than usual, so wasn’t quite as good. The meat was awesome as always.

From my cellar: 2011 Coche-Dury Bourgogne Blanc. VM 88. The 2011 Bourgogne is an excellent introduction to the domaine. Tension, energy and focus are the signatures in a wine that announces the Coche-Dury house style beautifully. Citrus and white flowers abound on the finish.

agavin: I brought this way overkill pedigree, which had a long citrus finish. Very nice.

Cold appetizers. Spicy beef, seaweed salad, cold chicken.

2006 Sine Qua Non The Hoodoo Man. VM 94. Sine Qua Non’s 2006 White Wine The Hoodoo Man is insanely beautiful. Remarkably fresh for a nine year old white, the 2006 The Hoodoo Man will change readers’ perceptions about what California white wines are and can be. A rich mélange of apricot, peach, honey and exotic white flowers graces the palate as this voluptuous, intense, yet remarkably vibrant wine shows off its utterly compelling personality. Slightly reductive, the 2006 needs a good bit of air. Today, the 2006 shows no signs whatsoever of fading. It should continue to drink well for another 5-10 years. The Hoodoo Man can only be called an absolute triumph in viticulture and winemaking. Time and again, I thought I had mixed up my glasses and that this was 2013 White Wine Résisté. The Hoodoo Man is 39% Roussanne, 31% Viognier and 30% Chardonnay; 75% from John Alban’s vineyard and 25% from Eleven Confessions. The wine was aged in 58% new oak, the rest 1-2 year-old barrels and a dollop of stainless steel.

French style Beef. Extremely tender and delicious, almost sweet, morsels of filet.

2012 Maurice Schoech Riesling Kaefferkopf. Middle dry.

Their interesting take on “walnut shrimp.” The fried shrimp, sweet mayo sauce, and walnuts is supplemented with pineapple! Not my favorite rendition of this dish. Still good, but I can live without the pineapple. We’ve gotten spoiled.

2012 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Leistenberg Riesling Kabinett. Vinous 87. Nectarine, pine nuts and lemon oil on the nose. Delicate tropical fruit flavors are brightened by a salty twang. Refreshing acidity gives a feminine character to the finish. Nicely balanced.

Duck part 2 (with bean sprouts).

2010 Cherry Pie (Hundred Acre) Pinot Noir Stanly Ranch Vineyard. VM 90. The appropriately named 2010 Cherry Pie offers up juicy red cherries, mint, cinnamon and cloves. In this vintage, the Cherry Pie has tons of energy and minerality to support the racy, sleek fruit. Sweet floral notes add lift on the finish. The 2010 is a gorgeous, exuberant Cherry Pie with great balance and overall harmony.

agavin: a very contentious wine at the table. Ron and I thought it tasted like cherry cough syrup. Way too high alcohol for pinot noir to my Burgundy pallet. Those who like more of a sledgehammer to the face loved it.

Some amazing Shanghai style soup dumplings (XLB). Tasty little morsels stuffed with pork and broth. We got 2 orders of these.

2012 Louis Jadot Gevrey-Chambertin. Burghound 89-91. A ripe yet markedly cool and restrained nose offers up notes of cassis, spice, earth, underbrush and menthol. There is a lovely mineral streak to the rich and relatively large-scaled flavors that possess excellent mid-palate concentration and plenty of verve on the complex and impressively persistent finish. This is a fine Gevrey villages and worth your attention plus it is sufficiently pliant to enjoy young but should reward longer term cellaring as well.

agavin: just super young one note village Burg. Not bad, but way too primary for my taste.

Simple vegetables. These barely had sauce, but yet were surprisingly yummy. They did have an “oil” flavor (in a good way) and were very light and crunchy.

2009 Château Branaire-Ducru. VM 92+. Red with a pale rim. The fruity nose hints at macerated red cherries, bitter chocolate and dried herbs. Then big, fat and soft on the palate, with fresh, harmonious acidity providing adequate lift to the black cherry, chocolate and sweet spice flavors. The long, plush finish offers a concentrated coffee and red fruit cocktail quality. Still very young and likely to develop more complexity. As good as this is, Branaire-Ducru is one estate where the 2010 will likely turn out to better than the 2009.

A very nice mixed fried rice.

2013 Sine Qua Non Grenache ♀. Super massive and extracted grape juice.

Pork hock. Some kind of crazy pig leg. Some serious fat here and the skin was a bit mushy, but the meat fell off the bone and was incredibly tender and delicious.

See the meat.

Giving her the bone!

2009 E. Guigal Châteauneuf-du-Pape. VM 92. Deep red. Potent cherry, redcurrant and floral scents are given a musky, earthy touch by a hint of rhubarb. Sappy, sweet and broad on entry, then tighter in the mid-palate, offering bitter cherry and raspberry preserve flavors and a touch of licorice. The clinging finish is shaped by silky, even tannins and given bite by a hint of cracked pepper.

Corn soup. Meat, peas, corn, carrots, egg. Super simple. Incredibly delicious. I don’t know what it was about this soup, both flavor and texture, but I had 3 bowls!

1994 Bodegas Muga Rioja Torre Muga. VM 94+. Bright, deep red. Expressive aromas of red- and blackcurrant, plum, tar, tobacco, and nutty, spicy oak. Sweet entry, then very concentrated and silky; really expands in the mouth. Strong acidity gives the flavors a penetrating, lively quality. Very long, subtle finishing flavors supported by firm but not harsh tannins. As suave as this extremely impressive wine is right now, it will be better for several years of additional bottle aging.

agavin: certainly my red wine of the night, as it had age and complexity. Really nice.

Lamb with green onions. A nice tender lamb.

2006 Inniskillin Vidal Icewine Niagara Peninsula VQA. GV94+. #1; COLOR-medium to dark golden; NOSE-pineapple jam exploding; apricot; mango; exotic; this is seductive; gorgeous nose; canned peaches; PALATE-huge viscosity; almost like cream; completely coats your palate; gorgeous pineapple; peach and apricot; the delicious factor is simply off the charts; virtually almost impossible not to like this; the fruit is fantastic; I would like a little more acidity, but this is delicious

Crispy whole red cod with sweet and sour sauce. A really nice fish, but VERY sweet and VERY fried.

2013 Larkin Cabernet Franc.
 Beef rolls with BBQ beef and cilantro. Really nice, tasted like rolled up Pho. The shell was a bit chewy and tough, which detracted.

Overall, another fantastic meal. Tasty Duck isn’t the most adventurous SGV place, but they do an excellent job. They were super friendly and willing to serve us the dishes one at a time over a long period. Tonight was better than on some of the overcrowded Saturday’s when they don’t have as much bandwidth for us.

The duck was first rate, as good as Peking duck gets — more or less. Although I was disappointed in the hoisin tonight. Some other dishes, like the pork hock, and the XLB were amazing too. A few others just so so, like the shrimp. Tasty Duck is all about the duck.

Also, as usual for Chinese, the order of the food is so crazy from a wine perspective nothing really matches up right.

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For more LA Chinese reviews click here.

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By: agavin
Comments (4)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: hedonists, Peking Duck, SGV, Tasty Duck

Witcher 3 – Middle Impressions

Mar14

cover-ps4-the-witcher-3-wild-huntTitle: Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

System: PS4 (also on Xbox / PC)

Genre: (A)RPG

Developer: CD Projekt Red

Publisher: CD Projekt Red

Date Played: February / March 2016

Rating: Sprawling and involving

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I had such a great time playing Bloodborne earlier in the year that I couldn’t resist another foray into the world of console RPGs — this time the highly regarded Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. And by the way, I’ve never played a Witcher game before, barely even heard of them.

But Witcher 3 has garnered tons of great reviews, sold 6 million copies last year, and has an interesting development history. CD Projekt Red is a Polish company that is relatively new (to making original games) and does its own publishing too.

Which leads me pontificate on Witcher 3 (and to a lesser extent Bloodborne) in the context of the history of video games and of RPGs — of which I have played (more than) my fair share over the last 35+ years. Although both of these 2015 console games are both great, and both technically ARPGs (Action Role Playing Games) they are worlds apart in style and design emphasis. As I discussed before, Bloodborne is essentially descended from Castlevania, with a bit of RPG DNA grafted in. Bloodborne is all about learning how to navigate through very fixed levels of extremely difficult monsters. You memorize where they are, and how to beat each type, and you do so primarily by mastering one of the best hand to hand combat systems yet made. The core of the game is closer to a Brawler (like Final Fight) or Fighting Game than it is to old school RPGs. The RPG element is a way to customize and level up your character.

Witcher 3, however, is a bonafide descendant of the OG RPG family. And while like all good games, it inherits from countless older games, if I were to pick a “most important ancestor” I’d go with Ultima IV: Avatar. Both games focus on questing (in U4’s case, proto-questing as the formal quest hadn’t been as formalized), big worlds, and moral choices. And I mean the greatest compliment to W3 by placing it in this family, for U4 is one of the best RPGs of all time, and W3 is a very modern, very worthy successor.

I have to say, that for a few hours I was a little disappointed with W3, thinking that it just wasn’t as good as Bloodborne (which I’d just finished). It’s certainly slower paced. But the game has really really grown on me. They are very different RPGs and W3 is fantastic in its own right, just with a total different design balance.

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Every game design team has to decide what they are interesting in focusing on, and you can assign them buzzwords, but let’s really break this game down by looking at separate elements and how the game emphasizes them.

Setting/Style/Graphics. W3 is set in this mysterious “northern middle ages” of the 1200s. It’s gritty and “real” except there are monsters and magic. The world is vast. Really vast. Fairly sparse, with a lot of riding or running around through the wilds. People eek out a living and it feels pretty authentically medieval. It’s based on a fantasy series by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. The moral style of both books and games diverges from the traditional black and white tropes of fantasy to offer an extremely (deliberately) gray scale picture of the world. The hero Geralt is a monster hunter and sword for hire, and he blends worldly cynicism with a certain heroism — but in the game all your choices have consequences (more on that below).

The graphics are realistic and naturalistically gorgeous. Not hyper colorful, nor drab.The world is lovely in a Northern way (bogs, forests, tundra, water, stone). I haven’t seen any desert or jungle. There is weather and time of day and very nice natural lighting. You often get these gorgeous sunsets and the like. The people are naturalistic, ugly even. Textures are very high resolution and there is a LOT of animation — pretty good animation at that  — not Naughty Dog great, but very good. The voice acting is spectacular as rule, particularly Geralt — which is a good thing given how much you have to listen to him.

Things are lusty. There is a ton of swearing. There are wenches and strumpets and actual nudity and sex. It’s kinda weird as I’m not that used to this in video games, but also at the same time like a bawdy 80s fantasy novel (which it derives from), and therefore slightly in the Conan school, but much darker.

There is also a ton of detail, particularly in the construction of minor ruins and castles. While built of similar materials, each feels uniquely constructed. Vistas abound, as do lush sunsets, the glare off ice blue water, the bright expanse of a sun spilling in through a castle window. Witcher is a pretty pretty game with a surprisingly un-game-like visual style.

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This enormous city is fully explorable

Story. There is a lot of story in W3, both in the past and in the present of the game. Bloodborne by contrast is a game with almost no present story, very little dialog, just a very complicated mood and world and a bunch of events that setup that world. W3 has all sorts of personal and political history, some of it from the previous games, but it also includes a monstrous (haha) number of hours of directly related, animated, voiced over story. Online I read that there are 300 hours of recorded dialog! This includes an enormous main story with very elaborate central quests and plenty of options as well as an epic number of side quests. Plus Geralt helpfully comments on things constantly.

Geralt's two main squeezes, Triss and Yennifer

Geralt’s two main squeezes, Triss and Yennifer

Questing / Gameplay. Like many RPGs before it, W3 aims for a a quest driven gameplay. It’s not a grind driven game, in fact monster XP is poor enough and monsters sparse enough that you’d be ill advised to go out just for the purpose of killing. It’s viable to explore “unknown markers” (question marks on the map) and discover/kill whatever is there, but these aren’t super dense either. Mostly, you work through the quests which will drag you into the game’s three main mechanics anyway: travel, investigation, and combat.

But let us compare the sub-balance with World of Warcraft. In that game, a quest giver will deliver a couple written paragraphs of mumbo jumbo, which you won’t read, which will basically sum up to “kill 14 boars in this zone” or “collect 7 blood crystals” which are either dropped or guarded by said boars. Mostly in WOW, you collect 3-4 quests that allow you to kill monsters in the same area repeatedly until you have finished off those quests. I rarely read much of the quest text, even though my main has the Loremaster achievement (having finished EVERY quest in the game!).

In W3, however, ALL the quest dialog is animated and blessed with voice over. This alone ups the interest level by a factor of 10 and is an impressive feat. Plus, the quest writing is far more character driven and the goals usually less about grinding some monsters. Most quests involve numerous steps before the kill, usually an investigation and some more dialog. This dialog usually offer Geralt choices, and the designers have cleverly set it up such that the quest usually finishes no matter how you chose, yet the consequences vary. In countless scenarios, someone must live and someone must die — and it’s usually Geralt who chooses, although not always with clear insight as to the ramifications of the choice. Do you want to get out of an argument by using the force, bribery, or violence? Well, you’ll get to chose (a lot). So not only did CD Projekt Red have to write the quests, then record, animate, and program them, they had to write them with branching options and multiple endings. This goes for both main and side quests too.

Now, there is some clever structuring here where the choices more or less fold back together, or in the case of side quests the varied consequences don’t matter to the main story. For example, you might be thrown into prison and can escape by stealth, combat, money or magic, but anywhichway you will end up at trial. Or you might have a choice to let a malfeasant go (and maybe get a reward) or kill them and collect the loot. Occasionally, these people you save will show up again later (or not) and your choices will have big long term consequences.

This is particularly the case with the “romances.” Geralt is a lusty fellow and he has two main love interests in the game, along with a couple (possible) side affairs and a whole bunch of “strumpets.” With the two main ones, how you play influences who you end up with, and it’s all a little hard to predict. I ended up consulting with the internet to try and divine the “best” choices — but the game is structured to elude any optimal solution. If you try to romance both hard, you end up with neither.

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Sometimes the feel is decidedly Eastern European fairy tale

Mechanics. if the questing is the mid level gameplay, the mechanics are the actual controls and combat. W3 has spread the love in terms of designer effort, and the lower level mechanics are good but not perfect. Combat has a variety of options and there is a nice skill tree. You can balance between melee and “signs” (simple combat magic). Brewing up potions is significant. The actual fighting is fun, and blessedly single character action based. One of the things that has scared me away from some recent well-reviewed console RPGs like Dragon Age: Inquisition is the party based combat. I never find it fun. Witcher‘s solo fighting is great. However, this is no Bloodborne, where a huge percentage of the design effort was spent on the intricate physical combat and the myriad weapons. In Witcher, all the weapons feel more or less the same and the game doesn’t “real your mind” with regard to the nuance of strikes, but it’s still satisfying head loping fun. Witcher‘s combat is also vastly easier than Bloodborne‘s nail biting encounters and bosses are just larger typical monsters, not highly specialized (and brutal) special encounters.

Geralt’s normal non-combat control also isn’t as stellar as Bloodborne‘s. He has a bit too much inertia and there is something a little funny going on with the rotation of the camera such that I constantly got turned around for a second — even after 50+ hours of play. In BB, the control is dead on, earning them an A+. Witcher‘s are more in B territory. They are good enough, and the overall game great enough (it really is a superlative overall game), that it’s not a problem — but they could have been better.

An interesting and new (to me) sub mechanic is Geralt’s skill at investigation. He has these Witcher Senses, which a bit like the sonar mode in The Last of Us allows you to slow down and see the important things in the world. But the Witcher uses this like no game I’ve played before. You can use it to look for look or monsters, but you also use it constantly to find secret passages, hidden traps, foot prints, blood stains, and to generally follow and track villains to their lairs. I have to say it’s a very effective mechanic, and very much in keeping with the exploratory pace of the game.

Also like The Last of Us, there’s a significant looting “minigame.” In that, there are chests, barrels, and bags of stuff EVERYWHERE and you can spend as much or as little time as you like scavenging from them — albeit with care, as sometimes guards take offense. Oddly, peasants don’t, so you can pilfer their houses right under their noses. I found lots of good stuff this way, and as crafting and alchemy require tons of materials and are very valuable in this game, I played as quite the petty larcenist.

Between Geralt’s various modes and gear, inventory management, the map, quest management, etc. there is a lot of menu use. And the menus can be a bit clunky, particularly getting in and out of shop keeps. The inventory has sluggish tabs and there is this strange need to page through them all to reach the shop keep’s “tab.” Then, if you want to actually equip an item you might have to back out of the whole store and go into the normal inventory. But at the same time, the game’s need to “keep it real” wth the dialog means Geralt will have to pound through “hey, how are you” “can I take a look at your goods” and “farewell, maybe I’ll be back later” types of useless animated dialog — again and again. Some of these asset and menu controls are more like C+ or B-. They don’t ruin the game, but they could use some programmer/designer love.

There are a couple additional side mechanics in Witcher 3. A major one is the Gwent card game. This is a Hearthstone/MTG style minigame available across the whole world. I found the pace too slow and after a couple (loosing) games just skipped it as best as I could. Some people might enjoy it, but I was more focused on the the main game. Sometimes there is also horse (or foot) racing too. This was closer to the main mechanics and I enjoyed it much more. Sure, it was sometimes hard to know where the race course was and accidentally straying led to frustrating losses, but for the most part it was fun.

You spend a lot of time on your horse Roach

You spend a lot of time on your horse Roach

Meta-Game/Progression. I’ve played hundreds of RPGs and Witcher has an unusual balance. Leveling is glacial. It’s several hours (maybe 2-4?) between levels and the amount of XP both needed and earned is fairly flat. 60+ hours in and I’m still at level 22. This isn’t like WOW‘s carefully orchestrated progression where early levels ding in quick secession and new abilities are dolled out one by one with ordered and rapid progression. In the Witcher, you have all your spells at the start. Sure you can improve and modify them with the ability points (slowly), but it’s mostly there to begin with. There is no choice of complicated rotations and the like inherent in each build (ala WOW or Diablo 3). Builds are more about emphasis. There is a lot of gear, but the Witcher sets, found through following specific treasure quests, are the best. Questing and exploration are more emphasized in this game than gear and character progression.

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Medieval Europe brought to life

Odds and Ends. PS4 load times are pretty abysmal, particularly when you die. Think at least 1-2 minutes on the load screen. This is a big detailed world, and the blu ray isn’t the speediest, so I half understand. But it’s possible to zone in, move 5 feet, die, and still spend over a minute loading. The programmers must dump all of memory and start over. I solved that problem in the mid 90s :-). Fortunately you don’t die that often, but teleporting across the world and back to turn in a quest or sell loot can be annoying. As is the “weight limit” mechanic. This is one of those “some RPGs do it” things, and I never love it. When you are full you even walk slow and can’t use fast travel! Another complaint is summoning and mounting Roach, your trusty steed. For some reason, he’s a bit shy, and he has a knack for always showing up behind you. Then when you mount up the camera somehow rolls around leading to an inevitable canter off in the wrong direction.

It’s also worth mentioning, that while Geralt is a bad ass capable of slaying the most fearsome of monsters, he must have fragile bones because a fall off the wrong roof or cliff edge can easily lead to instant death. Save often in the presence of these perilous foes.

The views are frequently just awesome

The views are frequently just awesome

Balance. It took me a few hours to adjust to Witcher‘s peculiar game balance. This isn’t a super fast paced game, but once you accept the beauty of it, and the incredible depth of its gorgeous, windswept, Nordic game world and complex moral/character driven plotting, this game really grows on you. Sure, if I were the producer I would have spent another month or so tuning up the inventory and control mechanics. But the game’s greatness transcends a bit of control clunk. And I have the impression Witcher 3 represents quite an improvement in this regard over the earlier installments. If the story / exploration aspects of fantasy RPGs appeal to you at all, than Witcher is a MUST PLAY, having created one hell of a real-seeming world.

NOTE: As of 3/13/16 I’ve completed about 75% of the game. More thoughts to come after I progress…

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Lots of classic monsters

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By: agavin
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Posted in: Games
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Melisse – 2008 Montrachet!

Mar10

Restaurant: Melisse [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]

Location: 1104 Wilshire Blvd.Santa Monica, CA 90401. (310) 395-0881

Date: March 8, 2016

Cuisine: California French

Rating: Awesome again

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And so we arrive at Part 3 of the epic three night 2008 White Burgundy Dinner series (Part 1 can be found here and part 2 here). This series of dinners, hosted by Burg-meister Don Cornwell, explores in great detail the best wines of a particular vintage, in this case 2008.

Tonight features “Mostly Montrachet” that is, the wines of the great “Le Montrachet” Grand Cru, often considered the best white wine in the world.

This particular dinner is at Melisse, one of LA’s few 2 star Michelin restaurants and also one of my favorites (you can find links to three epic Carte Blanche meals at Melisse in the brackets at the top of the post). Let’s just say that Melisse generally has every area of fine dining covered: great food, great wine service, great everything service, etc.

And with regard to the wines. In Burgundy, in 2008, up to the middle of June, when the moon was full on the 18th., the season had been cool, wet and miserable. The flowering was late and drawn out, promising a late and uneven harvest. The next six weeks happily saw a marked inprovement: plenty of sun, not too much rain – and what there was was sporadic and localised – though it was warm rather than hot. Temperatures rarely exceeded 30°C. Then the weather deteriorated. There was more rain and less sun right through to mid-September. A bleak summer indeed! Overall there was less precipitation on the Côte de Nuits than the Côte de Beaune, and less still in the Côte Chalonnaise. Chablis seems to have enjoyed the mildest weather of all. But inevitably, the incidence of mildew, oidium and botrytis became ever more serious as the weeks progressed. At various times from the beginning of May onwards, hail damaged the vineyards of Marsannay, Volnay and Meursault, Chassagne and parts of the southern Màconnais and northern Beaujolais.

At the last minute, however, more benign conditions returned and continued well into October. The harvest kicked off in the Beaujolais, as I have said, on September 15th. A week or more later the growers began to attack the Mâconnais and to some extent the Côte de Beaune. But many in the Côte d’Or held off until Monday 29th or even, in the Côte de Nuits, into October, and were able to profit from natural sugar levels of 13° and higher. It was the latest harvest for some years, requiring 110 or more, not 100, days from flowering to fruition.


Our testing  was setup in the elegant private room just to the right of the entrance.



Tonight’s special menu.

Flight 0: Amuses

2002 Moët & Chandon Champagne Cuvée Dom Pérignon. VM 98. Honey, almonds, butter, tropical fruit and brioche are some of the notes that emerge in the 2002 Dom Pérignon. Here the flavors are bold, rich and exotic, as they have always been, while the textural feel is one of pure exuberance. The 2002 remains dense, honeyed and totally voluptuous on the palate, with more than enough density to drink well for decades The style will always remain opulent to the core.

The first amuse is a Melisse staple. On the spoon are sphereized grapes dusted with pistachio. An explosion of grapeness.

Black Truffle Cheese Tart. Like a mini cheesy quiche.

Wagyu Beef Tartare. On a puffed rice. Soft and crunchy. All yummy.

Beef Béarnaise. Taking a card from the Jose Andres deck, the sauce was actually inside the little hush puppy-like thing.

The bread. I’m particularly partial to the green basil bread and the bacon bread (far left).

The starter for an amuse soup.

Spring pea soup. I like the combo of the warm soup and cool butter.

Flight 1

2008 Bouchard Père et Fils Montrachet. Burghound 98. At the risk of waxing poetic, the nose is genuinely like a spring day in a garden with utterly beguiling and multifaceted aromas of an implausibly broad variety of flowers, spices, discreet pain grillé, roasted nuts and a hint of garrigue that complements the dense, brooding and very serious flavors that are borderline massive yet, like the Cabotte, betray absolutely no sense of undue weight or blowsyness. The explosive finish stains the palate and coats the mouth with dry extract and this is one of the greatest examples of this wine that I have ever seen from Bouchard but be prepared to be patient. A true ‘wow’ wine.

agavin: one of my favorite wines of the night, certainly of the flight. Long finish.

2008 Remoissenet Père et Fils Montrachet Le Montrachet. VM 92. The 2008 Le Montrachet is a bit reserved at this stage. It shows good depth and energy in its fruit, yet remains heavily marked by the oak, which dominates the flavor profile and also dries out the finish a bit. I much prefer the approach the Maison took with the 2009.

agavin: nice.

From my cellar: 2008 Louis Latour Montrachet. Burghound 95. This is clearly the most backward and reserved wine in the range as the restrained nose reveals only hints of white flower, citrus and green fruit aromas that are trimmed in a noticeable touch of pain grillé. By contrast, the muscular and big-bodied flavors explode on the palate as there is a chewy texture to them yet the ample minerality present adds lift to the powerful and hugely long finish. This is not a Montrachet of finesse in 2008 but the abundant amount of dry extract should insure that it matures, and then drinks, over a very long period.

agavin: nice, but a little hot.

2008 Lucien Le Moine Montrachet. Burghound 93-95. Somewhat curiously, this is actually more elegant and refined aromatically as well as more powerful and more concentrated yet despite the jaw dropping size and weight, it remains focused, balanced and harmonious. We’ll see in time but at present, I give the Chassagne cuvée a slight edge.

agavin: more cloudy in the glass, a bit flat and flawed. Worst wine of the flight for sure.

2008 Louis Jadot Montrachet. Burghound 93. A moderately toasty nose of peach, apricot and citrus aromas that verge on the exotic and this character continues onto the delicious, generous and sappy medium-full flavors that offer real volume and mid-palate fat if not much finesse and the finish, while impressively scaled and persistent, seems to lack the focus that I expect from great examples of the vineyard. To be sure, this remains a very fine wine but at the moment, it’s not a genuinely great one. We’ll see in time whether it finds its center; if so, it will certainly merit a higher rating as the underlying material is clearly present.

agavin: very rich

Stonington Maine Diver Scallop. Salsify, Polenta, Sauce Perigourdine. A very nice rich dish with a variety of mushroomy flavors.

Flight 2

2008 Etienne Sauzet Montrachet. Burghound 96. The fresh and incredibly dense nose is inexpressive to the point of being almost mute and only aggressive swirling manages to coax glimpses of the floral, white and yellow orchard fruit, oak, spice and citrus suffused nose. By contrast, the gorgeously rich and massively-scaled flavors explode on the palate and in a distinct divergence from the Chevalier’s finesse, this is a bulldozer of a wine. No, this is not especially elegant at present but it has enormous potential though note that ample patience will be required.

agavin: very reductive

2008 Blain-Gagnard Montrachet. Burghound 95. A stunningly broad yet restrained nose displays breathtaking purity of expression, offering up incredibly complex and ripe white flower and green fruit aromas that complement beautifully balanced, harmonious and impressively scaled flavors that possess huge length and knockout depth. This is class in a glass with terrific vibrancy and the palate staining finish is almost painfully intense as there is so much extract that the palate impression is borderline chewy. This should age for several decades.

agavin: lots of acidity

2008 Marc Colin et Fils Montrachet. Burghound 95. What was a grudging nose has become notably more expressive now that it has been in bottle for almost two years with pretty and highly complex notes of white peach, pear, spice hints and ample pain grillé in evidence. There is nothing subtle about the huge, indeed even imposing flavors that brim with dry extract that completely coats and stains the palate yet there is ample acid support that keeps everything in perfect balance and harmony. In fact, the balance is so impeccable that I would call this a Zen wine that is somewhat less forbidding than I originally thought and thus I have reduced my suggested drinking window by two years. Indeed, there is sufficient mid-palate fat present that this could even be drunk now though there is so much upside that it would be a shame to leave so much of it on the table at this early juncture.

agavin: maybe a touch advanced, lots of botrytis.

2008 Marquis de Laguiche (Joseph Drouhin) Montrachet. Burghound 93-96. A perfumed and simply knock-out nose features highly perfumed notes of honeysuckle, acacia blossom, sandalwood and yellow orchard fruit aromas that give way to powerful, rich and dense full-bodied flavors that possess obvious muscle and simply huge length on the overtly austere, deep and palate staining finish. This is a dazzling effort that will only add to the already immense reputation this wine enjoys but note that patience will be required.

agavin: darker and quite rich.

Black Bass “En Ecailles”. Hope Ranch Black Mussels, Fava Beans, Shellfish Emulsion.  Nice soft fish, traditional butter derived foamy sauce, and then that treatment of the scales, all crunchy/crispy. Now to the taste the skin/scales was awesome. But something about its spiky regular texture seriously triggered the latent Trypophobia in me. Just thinking about it is creeping me out 48 hours later! CLICK HERE IF YOU DARE.

Flight 3: Not all Monty

2008 Coche-Dury Meursault 1er Cru Les Perrières. Burghound 95. A trace of reduction is not enough to mask the amazingly pure, cool and airy citrus peel, rose petal and essence of stone aromas that precede the energetic, intense and gorgeously well-detailed flavors that brim with plenty of palate staining dry extract. The explosive and mildly austere finish is shaped by firm but ripe acidity that is impeccably well-integrated and this should age effortlessly for years. This is textbook Perrières.

agavin: probably my favorite wine of the night! Just awesome. Reductive. Massive. Long. Textbook.

2008 Pierre-Yves Colin-Morey Montrachet. Burghound 94-97. A riper if less elegant nose presents a broad range of yellow and white orchard fruits with ample floral, spice and citrus nuances that also are reflected by the massively endowed big-bodied, powerful and muscular flavors of imposing size and weight, all wrapped in a palate staining, chewy and hugely long finish. One expects Montrachet to be great and the ’08 from Pierre-Yves Colin does not disappoint.

agavin: another fabulous wine with a long finish

2008 Domaine Ramonet Montrachet. Burghound 97. A highly expressive and radiant nose offers the purest fruit in the range as it offers up a mélange of upper register acacia blossom and freshly cut lemon-lime aromas trimmed in a discreet amount of wood. The nose is followed by strikingly detailed, stony and powerful broad-scaled flavors that culminate in a palate-etching finish of spectacular length. This is breath-taking stuff as balance is perfect and this should age well for years.

agavin: This bottle or at this moment wasn’t my favorite. Just too rich and hot (alcoholic).

2008 Coche-Dury Corton-Charlemagne. Burghound 98. A fantastically complex and beguilingly fresh nose of extract of liquid stone, green fruit, citrus zest and elegant floral notes dissolves seamlessly into rich, intense and beautifully mineral-driven broad-shouldered flavors that culminate in a superbly long and bone dry finish of positively Cistercian-like austerity. This is a wine that is absolutely packed with potential and I wouldn’t dream of opening a bottle before it had at least 10 years of bottle age and probably 12 to 15. I should note that this is anything but seductive yet I find the incredible delineation and purity of expression to be nothing short of brilliant.

agavin: another great wine. Lots of reduction and acid. Long finish. Not as great as the MP right now (I think it needs more time), but still very good.

Dover Sole Filet. Potato Gnocchi, French Horn Mushrooms, White Wine-Brown Butter Jus. Another great fish, although I miss the chicken from year.

Have a few glasses.

Flight 4: Dessert

1994 Fritz Haag Brauneberger Juffer-Sonnenuhr Riesling Beerenauslese. MFW 100. Dark orange yellow color; petrol and baked lemon nose; tasty, sweet, baked lemon and lime palate with depth, minerality and uplifting acidity; long finish

Rustic Caramel Apple Tart. Heilala Vanilla Ice Cream. Pretty much a perfect version of this traditional dessert. Great crunchy pastry texture.

Petite fours. pate de fruits, cannelles, macarons, cookies, chocolates.

The chef de cuisine.KEN TAKAYAMA. Chef Ken was born in Saitama, Japan and, from early childhood, was raised in Monterey Park, Ca. Straight out of high school, Chef Ken got his start at Kayo , a neighborhood restaurant in Monterey Park, learning traditional techniques for preparing robata, sushi, and tempura. Chef Ken’s previous experience in the kitchen also includes working under Christophe Moreau for Patina Pastry of the Patina Group in Burbank.

Chef Ken cites his grandmother as a huge influence on his family. She was a remarkable artist who drew and sculpted in leather. “Both of my siblings, Eriko and George, and I all followed creative career paths due to her powerful artistic sensibilities that she shared with us.”

 

food: As usual the food at Melisse is great. I generally prefer a more mega tasting menu with more flavors and the requirements of matching White Burgundy limited the options, and last year at this dinner we had more variety, but still there were some nice dishes here.

service: perfect.

agavin on the wines: Like the other two 2008 nights, all these wines showed a strong vintage character, namely that rounded, ripe, lots of botrytis. But the Montrachets were in general drinking fabulously. Almost any of these wines would be fabulous additions to more normal lineups. There were no premoxed wines in my opinion, with only 2-3 showing very slight touches of advanced notes on the nose. Nothing was obviously corked, although the Le Moine was flawed somehow. The Monty character were often strong and present.

Overall quality was quite high, but there was some serious doubt in the group as to how long to hold this vintage.

Voting results of the night were:

  • 1 Coche MP
  • 2(tie)  Coche Corton
  • 2(tie)  Colin-Morey Monty
  • 4(tie)  Bouchard Monty
  • 4(tie)  Sauzet Monty
  • 6   Ramonet Monty
  • 7   Remoissenet Monty
  • 8   Blain-Gagnard Monty

Don’s detailed notes can be found here.

Other big tasting dinners from this dinner series:

2008 White Burgundy part 1

2008 White Burgundy part 2

2007 White Burgundy part 1

2007 White Burgundy part 2

2006 White Burgundy

2004 Red Burgundy

2005 White Burgundy part 1

2005 White Burgundy part 2

2005 White Burgundy part 3

Related posts:

  1. Mostly Montrachet at Melisse
  2. Melisse – 2007 Montrachet!
  3. Melisse Madness
  4. Valentino – 2008 White Burgundy part 2
  5. Valentino – 2008 White Burgundy part 1
By: agavin
Comments (6)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: 2008 White Burgundy, Melisse, Montrachet

Game of Thrones – Season 6 Trailer

Mar09

The first Season 6 Trailer is here!

This finally shows a bunch of new clips – set to weird contemporary music – and reveals a taste of pretty much everyone’s thread. Major bits include:

Jon Snow’s body (duh).

Jaime apologizing to Cersei (also duh)

Jorah chasing after Dany (even more duh)

Melisandre sounding like a broken woman (surprise!)

Dany in chains with the horde (we knew that).

Cersei with a typical fun one liner (“I chose violence”)

Theon and Sansa alive.

The return of the Iron Islands.

The return of (all grown up) Bran — and more White Walkers.

Arya jumping off a building.

Davos’ closes it out over Jon Snow’s dead body…

If you liked this post, follow me at:

My novels: The Darkening Dream and Untimed

or all my Game of Thrones posts or episode reviews:

Season 1: [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]

Season 2: [11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20]

Season 3: [21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30]

Season 4: [31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40]

Season 5: [41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50]

Season 6: [51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57]

Jon-Snow_CNNPH

Related posts:

  1. Game of Thrones Season 4 Trailer
  2. Game of Thrones Season 5 Trailer
  3. Game of Thrones – Season 2 Trailer
  4. Game of Thrones Season 5 – Trailer 2
  5. Game of Thrones Season 6 Teaser
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Television
Tagged as: A Song of Ice and Fire, Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, HBO

Chuan’s – Even More Pepper

Mar07

I love me some Szechuan, and surprisingly, so do a lot of others because Szechuan places have become all the rage lately. The Hedonists recently headed back to Chuan’s to check out its spicy Szechuan fare a year+ after opening — this time with wine!

Read all the details here.

i-qjL5SLW-X2

 

Related posts:

  1. Chuan’s – Back for more Burn
  2. Palace of Pepper
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Chuan's, hedonists, Sichuan

Sidecar Donuts

Mar04

Restaurant: Sidecar Donuts & Coffee

Location: 631 Wilshire Blvd, Santa Monica, CA 90401. (310) 587-0022

Date: March 1, 2016

Cuisine: Donuts

Rating: Best (but pricey) donuts I’ve had

_

There has been a lot of buzz about sidecar donuts, a super trendy artisanal donut shop in Santa Monica. Truth is, I adore a good donut, so I figured I’d give it a try.

 The interior is very slick and clean. Not exactly Dunkin’ Donuts.

The donuts are baked every hour! And they sure look decadent.

Plus there are very creative flavors, although far less flavors than a typical shop. Here some flavors rotate daily and some weekly or monthly.

 I got a cappuccino too. Solid.

These are pricey donuts. They vary from $3-4 each! Normal donut shops sell donuts for slightly less than $1! But they do come in a fancy box. haha.

Here are the four I tried.

Maple Bacon! Raised doughnut topped with pure Vermont maple syrup glaze and crisp Niman Ranch bacon. Oh yes, I love a good maple bacon anything. This soft and sweet confection didn’t disappoint.

Huckleberry. Oregon huckleberry cake doughnut with huckleberry glaze.
Super soft and caky with a nice tangy berry glaze.

Saigon Cinnamon Crumb. Slightly sweet, slightly spicy Saigon cinnamon cake doughnut, topped with sweet glaze and a house made cinnamon crumble. Great cinnamon flavor and nice texture.

Coconut Cream. Our signature brioche raised doughnut topped with housemate coconut milk custard & cream, toasted coconut shards, and pie crust crumble. Arousingly good.

Overall, These were some seriously good donuts. You pay for it with a 4-5X multiple, so I wouldn’t be ordering them up en-mass for a party, but as I’m more calorie limited than worrying about a couple of bucks, definitely a treat!

The Mendocino Farms next door seems to be doing a healthy business too. Look at the line at 11:30am on a random Tuesday! I’ll have to try it out.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. The Bourbon Caramel Bacon Sundae
  2. Umami Burger at UMAMIcatessen
  3. Ice Cream & Coffee
  4. ThanksGavin 2011 – Salty Saturday
  5. Modern Breakfast – Huckleberry Cafe
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: coffee, Donuts, Santa Monica, Sidecar Donuts

Gods of Egypt

Mar02

Gods-of-Egypt-Fiery-PosterTitle: Gods of Egypt

Cast: Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Brenton Thwaites, Gerard Butler, Rufus Sewell, Geoffrey Rush, Alex Proyas (Director)

Genre: Fantasy

Watched: March 1, 2016

Summary: Deities & Demigods

_

Sure Gods of Egypt was panned and is tanking at the box office, but it’s a big budget fantasy movie with (vaguely) Egyptian deities and Jaime Lannister — how could I not go see that? I’m glad I did too, because this is one of those films, like Jupiter Ascending, that I enjoyed in the theatre, but would have bored me at home.

Looks dumb, huh?

But if you totally suspend disbelief. Ignore the voice over. Abandon hope of character development. Forget the incoherent mythology. And turn a blind eye to Egyptian religion cribbed solely from Dungeons and Dragons: Deities & Demigods.

If you can do all that, and just view it as a “Egyptian inspired fantasy”, it’s actually a fun romp. The film is gorgeous in a CGI kind of way. I mean, this movie may have the MOST CGI of any live action movie yet made. Ever. They must have built more real sets for a Star Wars prequel! And the character writing is simplistic. But the actors actually do a good job with it. Particularly Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, the two mortals Brenton Thwaites and Courtney Eaton, Chadwick Boseman, and the ever enjoyable Geoffrey Rush. And there are some funny lines. No one takes themselves very seriously, director on down. Gerard Butler’s Set is a little annoying, but not nearly as bad as the recent General Zod (barf!).

1280x720-HMI

But the GOE plot is easy to follow. Nonsense, in its way, but straightforward without a lot of mumbo jumbo. It’s an old score quest / adventure plot in that way. None of the battles last that long, which is great, although there are a lot of them. But they are each different. And there are many cool sets (ahem, CGI modeled sets). We have palaces, temples, secret tombs, the afterlife (loved Anubis), gods that are twice the height of people, and my personal favorite: Ra’s “boat of a million years.”

maxresdefault (1)

The film is ridiculously anachronistic, with modernistic jokes and like the recent Hercules movies (set in 1200 BC) where they ride horses with saddles, stirrups, and all that — none of which was invented until much later. Here, besides the gods and magic (fine), you have giant pedestrian freeways, stone traps made of rock with the properties of aluminum, sandals with buckles and all sorts of things that certainly didn’t exist even in New Kingdom Egypt, not to mention “pre-historic” Egypt when the gods reigned — but I didn’t think about it — again, Egyptian inspired fantasy world.

QWCkx

Some of the magic and general religious-magic was kinda cool. Like the way Anubis emerges and descends into a swirl of dust. The production did a tiny itty bit of research before throwing almost all of it out. When Horus sends Zaya’s soul to the afterlife he says something to the effect of “may the earth doors of Aker open to you, may the sky doors of Geb open to you” which is standard Egyptian magio-religious rhetoric out of the Book of the Dead.

Sigh. Too bad they’d never use this kind of giant CGI budget to an actual real plot set in a recreated real ancient world.

Find more movie reviews here.

goe_gallery_07a-512438375e.0

Almost looks like Beastmaster or something!

Related posts:

  1. Warcraft Movie Trailer
  2. The Lost Gate
  3. Book Review: The Lightning Thief
  4. The Wretched of Muirwood
  5. Movie Review: Thor
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Movies
Tagged as: Alex Proyas, Ancient Egyptian deities, Brenton Thwaites, Chadwick Boseman, Fantasy, Geoffrey Rush, Gerard Butler, Gods of Egypt, Horus, Movie Review, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau
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