We went to Napa for a one-nighter, and it was lovely, but I don’t think we’ll do it that way again. We stayed in downtown Napa, which was not cheap. The restaurants didn’t excite us, so we ate overpriced burgers at the rooftop bar in our hotel.
One highlight was the Silver Oak winery, which is quite famous for their cabernet sauvignon. The whole experience was ridiculously expensive but thoroughly enjoyable. We now have a special bottle to go with next year’s Christmas roast beef.
The other highlight was the spice shop at Oxbow Market. I’ve been on the hunt for fennel pollen, and they had it. I wanted it specifically for this recipe. I hope you can get through the Washington Post firewall to access it. Or email me, and I’ll send you a PDF.
Anyway, this rigatoni dish with sausage and fennel caused quite the fuss when the Bidens both ordered it at a restaurant. Some people have a thing about not ordering the same food off the menu. Dale and I order whatever we want, and actually, we often order the same thing. I didn’t see what the big deal was.
But I made the dish, and it was exceptional. This was the first time I’ve used tomato passata – pureed strained tomatoes sold in a bottle. Also the first time for fennel pollen, but we love fennel, so I wasn’t scared. The clerk double-bagged it, and yet my purse smelled like fennel for days. It was fantastic.
I would buy fennel pollen air freshener.
As for other wine country trips, maybe I’d stay in Santa Rosa next time and do tastings in Sonoma. We still haven’t been to Paso Robles, so that’s on the docket. Of course, we live in great wine country, so there’s no shortage of options.
I’ve been trying to avoid politics, but sometimes it’s in me, and it got to come out. Please feel free to move along while I share a few of my left-coast perspectives.
Early yesterday I read about Disney snookering DeSantis and thought it couldn’t get any better than that.
While I do understand Disney is no saint, as I understand it, DeSantis wanted to punish them for supporting LGBTQ rights after he passed the “don’t say gay” law. The governor hand-picked a board of conservatives and fundamentalist Christians to control much of the Disney World footprint in Florida. But Disney quietly did things by the book with public meetings and notices, all toward essentially stripping the new board of its power.
DeSantis and his folks didn’t even see it coming. I’m sure some sort of battle will ensue. There’s probably no moral high ground. In the end, it seems most things boil down to profits. However … Disney spoke up in support of the LGBTQ community, so I’m calling it a win for progressive values. And a loss for DeSantis, who in many ways, is scarier than Trump.
Which brings me to my earlier question … can it get any better than this? Well, it could, but I’m delighted Trump has been indicted or as he wrote on his social media platform, INDICATED. In the grand scheme of things, do I think this is the worst of his bad deeds? No, but at least we now have some evidence no one is above the law. He may very well be found innocent, and that’s fine, but at least he’ll go to trial like everyone else accused of such crimes.
To say he has a get out of jail free card just because he was president is unAmerican. You want to be a patriot? I don’t know – maybe you could join the military or pay your taxes.
As for indications, I hope this is the first of many.
Then, on top of it all, the sun came out! We got a blockbuster year of rain and snow to put a dent in the drought, and now we’re headed for some lovely weather. To celebrate, I thought I’d buy a six-pack of Bud Light. You can have all the fancy wines in the world, but nothing says spring like Bud Light.
In other words, if it’s Bud Light, you must indict.