My First Supper Club – Apt 4 Food and Wine
First, I must remark that Palladia is the best channel ever. As I write this post, they’re playing an Oasis concert from 2008. It’s great background music to get into the zen mode of writing about mine and Dr. Awesome’s first supper club experience. It all started (and I think I am repeating myself here) when I was watching the Cooking Channel and this pilot show called The Four Coursemen came on. They went to local places and sourced some great ingredients and held dinner for a bunch of people along with a wine pairing. They do this every so often and basically sell out each time. And that was it. I was on the hunt for something similar. Somehow (and it was probably on twitter…thanks social media!) I found out about this group called Apt. 4 Food and Wine. I signed up a couple of months ago and received an email about 3 weeks ago that they were going to do some summer dinners. I jumped. For $85 you get a 4-5 course meal (ours was 5 courses, even though it was advertised as 4) along with wine pairing. Definitely worth it. Dr. Awesome was a little skeptical because of the idea of going to some random peoples apartment and eating with strangers (he later ate his words). We trekked to South Williamsburg in the rain to meet our destiny. We ended up being the first people to arrive. Our hosts greeted us and gave us a glass of wine while they were still preparing our dinner. The guys were very nice and made us feel right at home. Plus, the apartment we were in was amazing, as you’ll see from the photo of the view they have of the east river.
There were supposed to be 8 of us eating, but only 5 of us showed up (the weather being a big factor). I think it was great that there were less of us. We really got to know each other well and had a great time. The 4 out of the 5 of us had never done something like this before, so it was nice experiencing this with other newbs.
Our first dish was a “salad” of market vegetables with mint and a shallot vinaigrette and was served with a Jean Bourdy Crémant du Jura (from France). There was a little squash puree too.
The next course was a tune tartare with strawberry gazpacho and was served with a 2010 Domaine de Sulauze Rosé “Pomponette” from Provence, France.
This was really cool. You wouldn’t think that strawberries and tuna go together. Well, in this, it definitely worked. And our host that did the wine pairings really knew his stuff. The rosé went incredibly well with the dish.
Third course: a deconstructed BLT – grilled romaine, tomato mayo and bacon (with bits of bread crumbs). Now, we were served the most amazing chardonnay. It was a 2006 Yering Station Reserve from Yarra Valley, Australia. You can’t get it here at all, so I think a trip to Aussie to get this wine will be in order. It tasted so much like the wood from the barrel. It was really amazing.
The main course: fettuccine with coffee-cured duck breast and a slow poached egg (in the shell!) served with a 2009 Cru Wine Company Pinot Noir from Santa Lucia Highland, California.
The eggs
When Dr. Awesome heard the words “duck” and “poached egg” he was smitten (and also “bacon” from the course before). During this dish, I asked Jay, the chef, if he had ever gone to culinary school, because everything was just so sensational. He said that he went for two years. Apt 4 started out as a wine club, but then expanded into doing dinners. They’ve been around for about a year and a half and are growing to the point where dinners now consist of people other than friends. Really interesting stuff!
Jay then presented us with a homemade peanut butter chip ice cream and banana fritters with a 2009 Robert Mondavi Moscato D’Oro from Napa Valley, California. Jay said he was afraid the ice cream wasn’t going to freeze in time, but all was well! (and extremely delicious!) I know what you’re thinking….Robert Mondavi…but don’t judge! This is from their wine club/reserve list and was a quality dessert wine.
Dr. Awesome and I left so so happy. It was a really great experience and we can’t wait to do it again. These guys (and lady, but she wasn’t around) really know what they’re doing and try to create a really friendly and warm environment while introducing you to wines and great food that was locally sourced. It’s also a great way to meet new people too. I highly recommend it and if you’re interested, definitely give Apt 4 a swirl. We’re going back…maybe you should come with us! 🙂
I YUM New York 