Drink, Memory
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
Audacity, thy name is Cocina de Vanguardia. I have never dined at the Spanish temples of “vanguard cuisine,” but I’ve long been curious as to how well this untraditional food, fomented as much in the lab as in the kitchen, pairs with wine. My opportunity to find out arrived last Thursday at a tapas blowout at Guastavino’s, followed by a benefit dinner for the James Beard Foundation. The guests of honor were the chefs of the chefs of three top Spanish vanguard restaurants: El Buli, Restaurante Arzak, and Restaurante Martin Berasategui. The tapas were prepared by other Spanish chefs of the vanguard.
I loved “Oil Soba ‘In Situ,'”an intense Japanese broth into which chef Paco Roncero squeezed a ribbon of creamycolored soba butter. But I’d not have guessed the dish would have been winefriendly until its salty richness was cut with the fresh, pear-inflected Castillo de Monjardin Chardonnay 2005 from a high-elevation vineyard in Navarra.
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