Garden Rant

Just drink it

Some house offerings (probably from an Etna winery) we had at a tiny pizzeria high in the hills above Taormina.

Sticking to the “Sicily only” section of the (many, many) winelists in Taormina was no problem. More and more of the wineries on the island are avoiding international grapes and overoaked methodologies to focus on the best of the native (give or take two thousand years) Sicilian varieties: nero d’avola, nerello macalese, inzolia, and cattaratto, to name just a few. These are tangy, citrusy whites and deep, earthy, somewhat acidic and often cherry-dominated reds. They’re great food wines. I also tried out the almond wine made by a few different producers there; it’s yummy, sherry-colored and sweet (most people really like sweet wine, though they pretend they don’t). Sure, there are Sicilian wineries making some great cabernets and chardonnays, but I didn’t bother. Which works well in Sicily.

But imagine if I was presented with a native grape section at any restaurant in America, featuring wines made from vitis labrusca grapes such as Concord, Niagara, Norton, and Catawba. Grape juice, fine. Wine? I don’t think so. Though a lot of wineries in America are using these grapes with perfectly acceptable results, most of us are thanking heaven for such pioneers as Dr. Konstantin Frank in New York and Wendt and Gallo in California, who focused on the great vitis vinifera varietals.

When it comes to wine, native can mean a lot (in Sicily) or nothing (in Buffalo).

My kind of garden show: Canada Blooms

Topless Gardening

Yeah, that headline caught my eye, too. Turns out that's only what you'll WANT to do after you imbibe a basil martini, according to the San Diego Union-Trib's cocktail writer. This is one of those summer drinks that we can only dream of as the wind howls through the rafters. So, in honor of it almost being Friday, dream away:

Muddle sugar and fresh basil
"Bathe in vodka and sweet-and-sour mix"--no proportions given.  Figure it out.  I'd go heavy on the vodka.
Squirt of lime.

That's nice, but there are other options.  Cocktail Times lists any number of herb martinis--ever floated a sprig of rosemary or cilantro in that glass?  They leave out lavender, which is suprisingly good in a cold gin martini. 

But my favorite summer cocktail is an adaptation of something I had in a bar once that we've since come to call Amy's Garden Party.  Crush some fresh basil in the bottom of a tall, skinny glass, add ice clubs and slices of fresh jalapeno, and pour a gin and tonic on top of it.  The perfect drink on a hot day.

Now all we need is a hot day.

Flowers + booze: always a good combination

Here’s a flower-related gift I bet no gardening columnist has yet recommended. I was trolling the aisles of my favorite gigantic local liquor store recently, looking for interesting bottles, when I found this:

It’s St. Germain, an artisanal liquor made from elderflowers that was launched last February. I was either uncharacteristically cautious or maybe just broke that day, because I bought the little trial size first, tried it on the rocks, and later bought the full size. I’m holding onto it to use with champagne, as I agree with NYTimes critic Florence Fabricant, who says:

On its own, this 40-proof liqueur, said to be the first made from fresh elderflowers hand-picked in the Alps and macerated in eau de vie, is pretty intense unless it's cut with ice and a splash of soda. But it adds a lush fruitiness to a glass of Champagne or white wine.

A beautiful belle epoque bottle plus a drink that smells of flowers and tastes yummy. Sounds like a fun gift to me.

The Total Rant Fantasy: A Vineyard In The Backyard

Two vines' worth of Niagaras from El's vineyard, plus unidentified pup

Here at Rant Headquarters, we think a nice glass of wine at the end of a long day of planting is a very fine thing indeed.  And if we're feeling really elegant, we might even take a shower before-hand.

We're all good with plants, so it's impossible to look deep into a glass of Zinfandel without musing, "Maybe I could make this stuff."  Of course, if it's been three glasses, not just one, the tone is more, "Hell, I know I could make this stuff."

So when we learned that El of Fast Grow The Weeds, one of our favorite correspondents, an architect, foodie, big reader and super-intrepid gardener, actually owns an old vineyard, we asked her to write a guest rant about her experience living our fantasy:

In the fall of 2004, we became farmers.

That is not an honest statement.  In October of 2004, we bought an old farmhouse in Michigan, and it had five of its original 38 acres still attached to it.  We were Minneapolitans at the time:  my husband and I wanted to move back to be closer to our respective Chicago/Detroit families after the birth of our daughter.  Secretly, though, I, as a frustrated zone 4A city gardener, just wished to be saved from Minnesota's short growing season.

Attached to this old farmhouse was a derelict fruit farm.  Almost all farms in the area are fruit farms of some variety or other; the region is known as the Fruit Belt , after all, so it should have come as no surprise to us that one of its five acres was a vineyard.  A vineyard!  How positively romantic, I thought: we shall stomp our own grapes, make our own wine.

There are five words in the English language that, strung together, have gotten me into immense trouble throughout my life.  These words are "How hard can that be?"

Drink The View

This week, the New York Times covered a new phenomenon in the delightfully artificial world of American living: planned communities centered around vineyards.

As far as suburban fantasies go, this is a step up.  Better for the environment than the whole golf community phenomenon.  And while I'd never be caught dead in any kind of development, this kind...well, I could see it.  I have big plans myself for a rocky field at my country place some day when I've got a bit of leisure.  Gewurztraminer grapes as far as the eye can see. 

The flowers shouldn’t be on the label

They should be inside the bottle. We enjoyed some delicious and fragrantly floriferous whites during the weekend of Garden Walk and it made me think of other wines I love during summer. There is plenty of warm weather left for most of us, and I¹m suspecting the serious garden work has subsided a bit (unless you’re one of the ones pulling out all your grass), so there’s more time to sit and enjoy. OK, maybe a weed gets yanked here and there, but this is mainly about sitting and drinking, with others—or alone (no harm in that).

Can you smell flowers in a glass of white wine? You sure can, and I¹m not talking about nutty Robert Parkeresque “nose of sweaty saddles and pencil shavings” stuff. But if you¹re drinking a wine from southern Italy and you swear you smell jasmine, that makes sense, because jasmine grows wild all over such areas as the Amalfi coast. Such was the case with a Falanghina I just drank the last bottle of (damn!). It is perfect for garden consumption: refreshing yet with that hint of flowers and a little bit of body so you don¹t gulp it down. But if you do find this, make sure it is no more than a year or two old.

The same goes with one of my all-time favorite summer drinks, Muscadet. It must be fresh. This white from the Loire is super-crisp, with a citrusy nose and taste. To me this is so much better than pinot grigio (which has similar properties). A better Italian choice, if you want that fresh mineral-y quality is Greco di Tufa, also from southern Italy. (I understand bottom-line concerns, but I will never, ever buy any of these wines this summer unless they are 2005-6. No one should. Take them off the shelves, please.)

If the wines are fresh, I don¹t think you need concern yourself too much with the maker. You won't be able to, as in most liquor stores you'd be lucky to find one example. Having said that, Feudi de San Gregorio is a great source for both Greco di Tufa and Falanghina. Here's some trivia: Falanghina is one of the wines made by the ancient Romans; it's what the inhabitants of Pompeii might have been swigging just before they got clobbered.

The one red I'll readily go for on a summer's day is Beaujolais—and there should be plenty of violet aromas with a good one. The cru Beaujolais (Fleurie, Brouilly, Morgon) are great, very quickly and lightly chilled—say, 2 minutes in the freezer? This isn't the sodapop nouveau stuff; this is delicate, nuanced red wine, but not in any way too heavy for summer.

I meant to get to dry rosés—oh well, next time!

Garden cocktails for a summer Sunday

by Eliz.

While spending the weekend in Stonington, CT, we ran across a restaurant bar that stocked some slightly-beyond-ordinary items. They are items many gardeners may have a superfluity of at this time of year. The Water Street Café is the name of the place and the bartender, Karen, was kind enough to share her recipes. She may have deliberately left things out (they do that sometimes), so feel free to experiment with and amend these.

Basil Mojito

Rim a rocks glass with sugar. Throw in a small bunch of basil leaves (about 6-7). Add about 2 oz. of chilled simple syrup (half sugar/half water) in which you have macerated a big bunch of basil leaves and some black pepper (strained out after a couple hours in the hot liquid). (You’ll want to have made this in advance.) Give the basil leaves in the glass a few grinds with a pestle, similar to what you’d do if you were making a mint julep. Squeeze in ¼ lime, leaving the lime rind in the glass. Add 1.5 oz. of rum and fill the glass with ice. Stir and garnish with a slice of lime.

My notes: this tastes better the more it sits. Also, the basil simple syrup is delicious and I’m sure could find nonalcoholic uses, as in lemonade.

The bar at Water Street Cafe, where being loaded comes naturally.

Tomato Water Martini

Make the tomato water. Throw 4-5 fresh tomatoes in the blender. Let the mixture drip through a sieve lined with cooking gauze or a coffee filter. Chill and mix with equal parts vodka or gin in a shaker with ice. Garnish with basil and a cherry tomato (organic and preferably heirloom). I think I’d probably serve this over ice as well; in hot weather martinis can get disagreeably warm pretty quickly.

I tasted the tomato water solo and it is really, really good: a clear, lively flavor, much better than tomato juice for this purpose. It does look like water too. I wonder if she salted it though; she may have.

With this post, I inaugurate the Garden Rant “Drink This” category. As one way of filling it, this fall I’ll be visiting wineries near and far and interviewing growers and winemakers (New York State and Southern Ontario both have well-established viticultural regions). The category won’t be limited to wine, though; it will include any agriculturally produced liquid that one can ingest without serious harm.

Salut!

Oh, and do any of you make drinks that utilize your gardens? Please feel free to share!