Out to play @Rocpool, Inverness

View from the Rocpool restaurant

On Friday I got out to play for the first time since I injured myself through slipping on black ice on 2nd January. We took the train from Kingussie to Inverness to meet up with Diane and John, who we met in an international hotel in Beijing last year, for an indulgent Friday lunch at the Rocpool restaurant. 

The great advantage of having the restaurant's wine list on-line is that you can choose at least the first bottle in advance, so we were able to order a bottle of the Domane Wachau 2016 Grüner Veltliner even before we sat down. The GV (sensibly closed with a screwcap) was very crisp, clean and citric making it a good apéritif.

This was my first visit to Rocpool for a number of years and I was definitely impressed with the food, wine list and the quality of service. Both the food and wine list are typically Modern British eclectic with influences from many different cuisines. We opted for the set lunch – two courses for £16.95. It was little surprise, however, that after our two courses we went for either a dessert or cheese. 

Our starters:

 Fritto Misto of king prawn and baby calamari with
marinated plum tomatoes, fresh lemon, chilli &

crispy capers

  

Carpaccio of beetroot with Highland blue cheese & 

roasted hazelnuts with fresh mint and aged balsamic  

      salad of parma ham & shaved Williams pear with 

pecorino cheese, broad beans, lemon & mint 

Once we had finished the Grüner Veltliner we moved onto some red with an impressive – soft and spicy – 2015 Primitivo Salento, Critèra from Schola Sarmenti – as our initial choice.

Main courses: 

Pan fried breast of chicken with wild mushroom risotto, 

black pudding, rocket & shaved parmesan

Pan fried fillet of sea bream with oriental stir fry 

of baby pak choi, steamed jasmine rice & crispy fried
shallots with cashew nuts, sesame & basil

2nd red: 

2011 Colline Teramane, Montepulciano d'Abruzzo

Fantini Farnese

 

 

The 2011 Colline Teramane, Montepulciano d'Abruzzo Fantini Farnese is obviously from further north with greater acidity and also more structured than the Primitivo. 

Desserts & cheese:

 Affogato – vanilla ice cream with a shot of 

expresso & liqueur of your choice

 Triple chocolate praline tart with salted caramel ice cream

Instead of a dessert I opted for a selection of cheese from Rory Stone (Highland Fine Cheeses). All were made from ewe's milk.

A visit to Rocpool is definitely recommended..... 

 

  

Excellent meal@Sweet Melindas, Edinburgh

Sherries from Gutiérrez Colosía on the opening page of the wine list at Sweet Melindas

Almost the moment we received an email telling us that we would be eating at Sweet Melindas, a restaurant specialising in fish, during our short stop-over in Edinburgh, we got a text from friends who were enjoying a meal at the restaurant and recommending it to us. 

So when we sat down at our table on Saturday night we had high expectations. Any concerns I might I have had were immediately still when I opened the wine list to find that the first page was devoted to three Sherries from Bodegas Gutiérrez Colosía (http://www.gutierrez-colosia.com/). Gutiérrez Colosía, which was established in 1838, is not a bodega I have come across before, so I was delighted to be able to try the wines and even more to see a restaurant that has the cojones to lead with wines from Jerez, even if they are more fashionable than they were. 

Three Sherries were listed: a fino, an amontillado and a Pedro Ximenez. They are offered either by the glass (125ml) or by the carafe (250 ml). The carafe is a really good idea not only is it proportionally slightly cheaper (Fino: £4.20 a glass/ carafe £8.20/ Amontillado: £5.80 a glass/ carafe £11.30). As there were four of us we choose a carafe of fino and one of amontillado. The amontillado was particularly good and complex. 

2011 Grüner Veltliner Terrassen Federspiel, Domaine Wachau

The food lived up to this bright start, especially my perfectly cooked scallops, crab pasta dish. After the two Sherries we drank quite a floral but crisp 2011 Grüner Veltliner from Domaine Wachau that matched our fish dishes very well. 

When, at the end of the meal, I said how good it was to see a restaurant promoting Sherry, we were told that they were looking to add an Oloroso but they didn't think the one from Gutiérrez Colosía was good enough, so they were looking elsewhere. Clearly at Sweet Melindas they do take great care with our wine list.     

Plachutta: exploring the art of lunch in Vienna

 2009 Federspiel, Hinter Der Burg, Grüner Veltliner, Prager

It is, of course, self evident that lunch is not the same as dinner. There is a thrill about a long lunch that is naturally not present at dinner as part of the fun of a week day lunch is that others are working while you are enjoying and pampering yourself. Even for the self-employed there is the delicate whiff of the illicit about settling down to a good lunch.

There was an element of this last Monday seated in Plachutta, an apparently well known Viennese restaurant and certainly buzzy with good, skilled service. Looking at the wine list before CRM arrived – I had stayed on at the Renaissance Hotel getting on with the 99th edition of Circle Update, the newsletter of the Circle of Wine Writers. CRM had headed out to do some sightseeing, although sadly the lovely weather of the first two days of the European Wine Bloggers' Conference had been replaced by wet, cool weather.

I had hoped that the restaurant would have some half bottles, so that we could have a white for the apero and a red for the Tafel Spitz (boiled beef in stock with vegetables and marrow bone), which one of us planned to have since it is the restaurant's speciality. One guide book claimed that they had raised Tafel Spitz to an art form – which proved to be the case.

There were no half bottles, although there was a selection of wines by the glass but I decided to a go for a bottle of 2009 Grüner Veltliner from Prager (Wachau), which had both some youthful weight and mineral vibrancy and was actually a surprisingly good counterpoint to the beef.

We shared the selection of starters, which included beefsteak tatar and jellied goose liver paté. Then came the tafel spitz for CRM. You start with some of the stock and vegetables, before trying the generously thick slice of boiled beef. I don't know what the cut used is but it seemed similar to sirloin and wonderfully tender. Left out of the stock for a while the beef did become a little less melting. You finish with the beef marrow spread on dark rye bread.

Clearly tafel spitz belongs to the tradition of substantial dishes like pot au feu that are often eaten as two dishes the cooking liquid and then the meat and vegetables, although certainly Plachutta's version is decidedly refined.  

I chose that other typical Viennese dish – Wiener Schnitzel – here made with the traditional veal rather than pork and also excellent. A fine pampered lunch and a fitting conclusion to our stay in Vienna.