Wine, Whisk(e)y, Beer, and Bites!

The rambling blog of an amateur gourmet cook, wine expert, and beer & fine liquor and liqueur connoisseur.

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Just printed this for my refrigerator. Thanks tumblr, once again you are AWESOME.

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In case you’re wondering how accurate this is, I compared them to a local restaurants sheet they have in their kitchen and everything is dead on. 

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Here is that sheet I was telling you about earlier anon

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FOR ALL THE PEOPLE WHO INSIST THAT KETCHUP HAS TO BE REFRIGERATED

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OH FOR… *sigh*  I’ll repost this in the morning, but if you have friends or relatives in swing states where these BS tactics are being trotted out, especially if they are PoC who’re being heavily targeted, make SURE they know that “phone voting” is a SCAM! This is NOT just in Virginia, Virginia’s just getting hit with last minute calls from live humans: “But it’s not the first time that voters have reported being told they can vote over the phone, most recently in Virginia, Florida Indiana, and North Carolina. Until now, however, the reported incidents have always been robocalls. Prospective voters are given a number, usually a defunct line, to call on Election Day.”

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Note for the new followers: In between the naked people photos I post nature photos, wine & beer reviews, and recipes.  Don’t worry, there’re more naked photos coming later tonight.  But the recipes & stuff are good too.  They’re all pretty much my own creations.

Step 1: Place 4 boneless center cut pork loin chops in shallow pan, stab with fork multiple times then flip & stab again. Dust with sea salt, Herbs de Provence, fresh cracked black pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder.  Take 1/4-1/2 (depends on size of pan and chops, liquid level should NOT cover chops, it should be about 1/2 way up the cut) cup rich medium dry red wine (I used a lovely Cabernet Franc) and add a teaspoon-ish of balsamic red wine vinegar & a few dashes of Worcestershire.  Pour over the chops, let soak 1-3 hours.  Flip chops, dust with seasonings again, let stand another 1-3 hours.

Step 2: Place several large baking potatoes (depending on how many you’re feeding) WHOLE in their skins in a large pot with 1-3 whole giant size garlic cloves.  Cook until tender. 

When the potatoes are nearly done, place the pan with the pork chops under a broiler at 350.

Step 3: Mash the potatoes & garlic together, adding milk and butter (you can use margarine, but seriously…) as needed (amounts vary depending on number of potatoes, you want them creamy but not RUNNY) and mix thoroughly.  Add salt, pepper, or additional garlic to taste.  Cover & leave on low.

Step 4:

Remove the pork from the broiler, turn oven off.  Place the chops on a heavy plate or small baking sheet & put back in oven on lowest rack to rest while staying warm.

Step 5: Add remaining marinade and pork juices to a saucepan.  Add another 1/4-1/2 cup wine and a slurry (several spoonfulls, depending on the amount of liquid, mixed in to water first to avoid lumps) of corn starch.  Stir over low heat constantly as it thickens, remove from heat immediately when it’s almost gravy thickness (per personal preference). 

Step 6: Plate chops & side vegetable of choice (I used fresh green beans steamed with butter & garlic), make large mound of potatoes with center well, and add gravy.  Chops should be VERY moist, you can put the gravy on them but it is not needed.

Next up, breakfast with the leftover potatoes! 

[slesfoodpr0n]

Annnnd here's an example of how my food posts will look, here's some pork chops & herbed potatoes in Cabernet Franc sauce! (note: the originating blog has some NSFW and objectionable content in other posts, that's why I'm moving all the food, wine, beer, and booze stuff here!)

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Food, Wine, Beer, & Booze Fridays No. 1

I warned you guys this Tumblr would be schizo. On Fridays I usually visit a couple of local food & wine shops for the samplings, this’ll be where I report what I found.  I’ll probably also toss some of my recipes in here between the pics of naked girls, bugs, and memes.

We started tonight at Dawson’s, the local beer, liquor, and wine (in that order) specialty store.  Four wines tonight, a California Napa/Carneros Pinot Grigio (name eludes me) that was OK but overpriced ($23 on sale!) and overly done with malolactic fermentation.  Then we had a tasty little Priorat (Spain) Grenache/Syrah/Cab blend, again the name of which eludes me but I’ll have go back & find it for $14.99.  Next up was a DiStefano Columbia Valley Meritage at $18.99, decent stuff, good proportion of Cab Franc instead of loading it on Merlot, and it’ll be better in 5 years.  Finally OHMAGAWD a Clos De Taman Laudun Cotes du Rhone Vilages 2009.  I love this bottle.  I want to marry it.

Then we tried the beers.  They had Shock Top beers today.  The regular Shock Top, which I’d had before, is a Belgian wheat beer, similar to Blue Moon.  It’s an acceptable draft beer if there’s nothing else to drink.  Then I went to their Raspberry Wheat Beer.  OH GAWD WORST BEER EVER.  What the FUCK was this shit?  I spit that crap OUT.  It was brave to even TASTE it ‘cause it smelled FOUL.  I’ve had raspberry wheat beers (not anything like a raspberry lambic) before, and there’s usually a tiny hint of flavor.  Not this shit… it STANK like artificial raspberry soda, and id tasted like someone took Budweiser and poured said soda in to it.  VOMITOUS TRASH and I’m sending them nasty email.  Finished up with their seasonal Pumpkin Spice, which was actually ok… hint of pumpkin pie in the scent, but no overpowering flavors, little bit of clove & allspice, not too hoppy.

That was it for Dawson’s, so we left with my new girlfriend (aka that Cote Du Rhone) and headed to Fishpaw’s, which’s a gourmet food market with a great wine selection & some good beers & liquors.  They’re closing out their roses for the season, so we had a Cote Du Provence 100% Grenache Rose that was decent, then some Paul Jaboulet Parelle 45 Cote du Rhone Rose, then a Portuguese Vinho Verde rose.  All decent.  (For those who’ve only ever had trashy American roses this stuff’s a world apart.)

Then we got some REAL beers!  They had a selection from Fat Tire, a killer Colorado brewery:

The 1554 was FANTASTIC dark beer with a bitter coffee finish I LOVED.  The Trippel with Coriander was DELICIOUS, I want to do some steamed fish with Jasmine rice to have with it.  The regular Fat Tire & the Hoptober were ok.  The IPA, and I say this as an IPA lover, was a disappointment.  Serious case of cat urine taste & smell on the finish.

Last and least we sampled the new-ish Wild Turkey American Honey.  Wild Turkey’s been making a honey-Bourbon liqueur for years.  Unfortunately there’s been a really distressing change, driven chiefly by Malibu and its line of shitty flavored booze, to take long term decent products like Wild Turkey Honey, Southern Comfort, and Cruzan flavored rum & reformulate them with less alcohol, cheap artificial flavors, and a LOT more sugar.  While Wild Turkey actually UPPED the proof a bit, bucking that trend, they did go WAY sweet on this, to the point it needs bitters, lemon, SOMETHING to mellow it enough to be drinkable.

After all that we needed a snack, so we went to the food counter.  First up was a DELICIOUS custom-blended in the deli herbed goat cheese spread.  This stuff rocked, and we took a pound home.  Then there was a decent red pepper tapenade, tasty & flavorful, needed a little more spice.  We have some anchos at home that’d fit it nicely.  Third up was a kind of bland roasted red pepper hummus, it DESPERATELY needed some Sriracha and a few other things.  Last up was a fig dip they were recommending we have with the goat cheese, but honestly it would’ve been WAY too sweet.  HOWEVER, I tasted the fig dip & knew exactly what to do with it.  I’m gonna get some thick cut smoky bacon, center cut pork chops, mushrooms, and wine.  I’ma lay the chops & mushrooms in a on with some wine, butter, shallots, and spices.  Then I’m gonna smear the fig dip on the chops & use it to “glue” bacon on & cook it all up YUM.

Last note for the evening, it pays to be nice to the people at your local wine shop:

Yep, you’re reading that price tag right, but I didn’t pay that for it.  They had 3 bottles of the ‘06 left with the new vintage coming in, they got 3 cases of the ‘06 from the distributor at a GREAT price, and they passed some of that along to preferred customers.  Which means I just got that bad boy for $39.  It was my one big indulgence for the month, I really couldn’t afford it but I would’ve kicked myself if I’d passed a deal like that up when offered.

That’s all for now, back to naked women in a bit!

[slesfoodpr0n]

Just to give you guys an idea, here's a reblog from one of my beer, wine, and food posts.  :) Warning, the originating blog is NSFW and other posts contains material you may find offensive.

[slesfoodpr0n]

Hello Tumblr!

My name's James.  I'm a long time food lover, I have been cooking since I was very young & have always loved trying new things.  I've worked in a number of restaurants, usually front of house, but I've spent as much time as possible in the kitchens picking up tricks.  I've worked in the wine & spirits industry since the late 90's in various capacities, and while it's not my current full time gig I keep a toe in here & there.  I'm a lover of well crafted beers, fine wines, and rare spirits (especially whiskeys/whiskies as you'll note from the title).

I have another Tumblr where I share my photography, humor stuff, and politics but not everyone there wanted to see all my beer, food, booze, and wine stuff, and some people who wanted to see THAT stuff didn't want to see a lot of my NSFW photography or my rants about politics & religion, so I made this Tumblr.

I'll probably start this off with reblogs of recipes & coverage of wine/beer/booze events from my other blog, and then start new posts here.  I don't generally cook with recipes, so I tend to take photos while I'm cooking & then post photos so I can remember what the heck I DID!  I also go to wine/beer/booze tastings several times a month & I take notes and photos, which I'll share here.

I hope some of you find this interesting, and I would love to get questions, feedback, tips, etc on what I post, on your ideas, etc. Bon apetit!