2011 Dark and Delicious the Annual Petit Syrah tasting event was held last Friday February 18th. So we had to (yes, had to) tie it up with the celebration of the Chinese new year.
It all started with smoked duck breast - Robert really wanted some smoked duck. Then he came up with the idea that we would make a noodle salad with it. So I ended up making a smoked duck salad with Kishu mandarins, Taiwanese cabbage, red bells, edamame, and fried shitake and rice noodles.
I smoked the duck breasts with Cedar, Jasmine rice, Puer tea, star anise and the mandarin peels.
For the dressing - homemade plum sauce made with last summer’s homemade plum jam.
Clayhouse Winery sent us three bottles of inspiration and the dressing turned out a perfect pairing with their 2007 estate Petit Syrah including some sesame oil for that finish I can only describe as buckwheat.
It’s always a risk pairing Asian flavors with petit Syrah but when it works, it’s a risk well worth taking. It was a refreshing, complementing and balancing dish and it would have been absolutely awesome if the event organizers actually physically positioned us next to Clayhouse. But they didn’t because there are side effects to “tasting”.
Happy New Rabbit year!
