{"id":5420,"date":"2011-07-07T23:53:21","date_gmt":"2011-07-08T05:53:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/?p=5420"},"modified":"2019-04-29T23:00:18","modified_gmt":"2019-04-30T03:00:18","slug":"cherries-charcuterie-wine-le-tour-de-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/cherries-charcuterie-wine-le-tour-de-france\/","title":{"rendered":"Cherries, Charcuterie, Wine & Le Tour de France"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Charcuterie

Charcuterie Plate (c)2011 LaDomestique.com<\/p><\/div>\n

What’s inspiring me right now? Le Tour de France. That’s right, La Domestique loves cycling and the drama of stage races that force riders to climb mountains like the Pyrenees. I met and fell in love with the husband on my bike. For me, cycling is about freedom, speed, the places it has taken me and the people I’ve met. I watch the Tour de France for the racing, but I also use the route to discover food, wine, and the beautiful countryside. It’s more than the world’s most challenging bike race, it’s a captivating story. In honor of Le Tour, I’m telling a story with the charcuterie plate. It’s not just cheese and cured salumi, people. We’re feasting on the livelihood of artisans from all over the world- real people putting their hearts into the food we eat and the wine we drink.<\/p>\n

Gathering Ingredients, an Adventure<\/h4>\n

The story begins with sweet cherry season in Colorado. Today I’m putting cherries on the charcuterie plate for what the french call l’ap\u00e9ritif<\/em>, and we Americans know as happy hour. The sweet, tart, deeply flavored fruit gets along great with gamey, spicy cured meats. This week I picked up a couple different varieties of cherries from First Fruits at the Boulder Farmers Market<\/a>: sweet black Tartarian<\/em> and the more tart Brooks<\/em> cherry.<\/p>\n

Then I headed over to Alfalfa’s<\/a> market for some cured salumi. After much tasting and deliberation, I chose to pair the cherries with a Chinese style salumi made by the passionate Il Mondo Vecchio<\/a> in Denver, Colorado. Their Lop Chong<\/em> is a dry cured pork sausage made with soy and ginger. It’s sweet upon first bite but over time a spicy heat begins to build on your taste buds. I thought the Asian style sausage would be fun to pair with sweet, juicy cherries. Choosing a cheese was the tough part. Looking for something smoky I came across Haystack Mountain Applewood Smoked Ch\u00e8vre<\/a> made in Colorado. The creamy, acidic cheese pairs well with the spicy Asian sausage. I also picked up a blue cheese from France, Fourme D’ Ambert<\/em>. According to Cheese, A Connoisseur’s Guide to the World’s Best<\/a>, this cow’s milk farmstead cheese is made in the Auvergne region or south-central France.\u00a0Fourme D’ Ambert<\/em> is moist and creamy, pungent and buttery- delicious with sweet cherries. The word “Fourme” refers to the cylinder shape of the cheese mold.<\/p>\n

My last stop was for wine at my local shop, Superior Liquor<\/a>. Stage 7 <\/a>of the Tour de France takes riders from Le Mans to Ch\u00e2teauxroux through one of my favorite wine regions: the Loire Valley. This region is known for its whites: the crisp, dry Sauvignon Blanc of Sancerre and Pouilly Fum\u00e9; long aging Chenin Blanc from dry to sweet; and easy drinking Muscadet from the seaside. However, the Loire is also home to the good value red wines of Touraine made with Cabernet Franc grapes. I sought a red wine to pair with the cherries and charcuterie. Mataej helped me pick Domaine Joel Delaunay L’Antique des Caboti\u00e8res (2006)<\/a> from Touraine. It’s a deep, dark red made with 65% Cabernet Franc and 35% Malbec grapes. To me, L’Antique des Caboti\u00e8res tastes of dark cherries with a hint of game. I pick up a slight and pleasant bitterness or vegetal quality that I attribute to cab franc. The oak is well balanced and with soft tanins on the finish. Even though the use of Malbec is a bit unusual for the Loire, I think L’Antique des Caboti\u00e8res exhibits everything I love about reds from this region: easy drinking but interesting, good fruit, well balanced and food-friendly. I will happily drink it with the Asian salumi and ripe Colorado cherries. Thanks for your help, Matej!<\/p>\n

\"Red<\/p>\n

l’ap\u00e9ritif<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>Domaine Joel Delaunay L’Antique des Caboti\u00e8re 2006 Touraine<\/p>\n

Sweet Red Tartarian & Brooks Cherries {Colorado}<\/p>\n

Lop Chong Asian Salumi from Il Mondo Vecchio {Colorado}<\/p>\n

Haystack Mountain Applewood Smoked Ch\u00e8vre {Colorado}<\/p>\n

Fourme D’ Ambert Cow’s Milk Blue Cheese {France}<\/p>\n

\u00a0Every cheese and charcuterie plate tells a story. I’ll be enjoying this one while rooting for teams Garmin-Cerv\u00e9lo, BMC, and RadioShack in Stage 7 of the Tour de France today. I can’t wait to see the towns and beautiful scenery as well as fierce competition on the roads. Thank you Le Tour! Thank you for the inspiration in sport and in life!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What’s inspiring me right now? Le Tour de France. That’s right, La Domestique loves cycling and the drama of stage races that force riders to climb mountains like the Pyrenees. I met and fell in love with the husband on my bike. For me, cycling is about freedom, speed, the places it has taken me […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","spay_email":""},"categories":[174,9,92],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5420"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5420"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5420\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19427,"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5420\/revisions\/19427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dsweb.jessicaotoole.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}