Chocolates & Wine

Seemingly ubiquitous, but neither of us
have ever tried it

The good great news is: David's been accepted into Cornell's (fully funded) doctorate program. The bad news is: he'll be moving to Ithaca for at least three years. Tomorrow, David will be spending a little more than two days upstate in search of adequate housing before leaving for New Orleans/Florida for his annual family vacation (which I'll sadly be missing out on this year). I decided to bring him home something a little sweet... and bubbly to go along with dinner.

The first amusement I unwrapped for David and I was a bottle of Lamarca (DOC) prosecco ($13). I'd seen this particular prosecco a handful of times at the local liquor store and a handful more in advertisement form in culinary periodicals. On feature at PJ Wine, I decided to finally give it a try. Once home, I chilled the sparkling wine in our refrigerator for a little more than two hours before extracting its cork for a first taste.

Surprisingly, the wine was much mousse-ier (as in a crémant) than either of us had expected. I also found the wine to still be a touch too warm for my taste, so I placed the bottle in the freezer for a brief moment (even though Mireille Guiliano says, [the freezer is] like a shock champagne does not care for). Upon second taste, both David and I were surprised to find that its character had changed almost completely. Nearly gone was the warm, "mousse-y" finish, replaced with a much stronger acidity and crispness. I remarked to David, This wine is almost like a shape-shifter!

Assorted chocolates from Dean & Deluca

POST-DINNER I unwrapped a box of hand-selected, assorted chocolates from Dean & Deluca, SoHo. Keeping in mind David's fondness for dark chocolate, I judiciously selected four which I thought would appeal to both David and I equally. My selections (all dark chocolates): caramel with grapefruit juice; violet ganache with candied violets; fleur de sel infused caramel; and Alaea Hawaiian red salt caramel. My favorites were the salted caramels--the Alaea red salt was amazing! And our chocolates paired very nicely with the Lamarca... which we'd managed to save just enough of to pair with dessert!

Dean & Deluca SoHo, 560 Broadway @ Prince Street