Saturday, February 20, 2021

February 18 was National Drink Wine Day

I learned a day after the fact that February 18 was National Drink Wine Day. It was also the day that the northeast was going to get the storm that devastated the south. We were bracing for being stuck in our home (well, we already are kind of stuck in our home a la global pandemic) for a few days. I decided that I would make Ina Garten's Beef Bourguignon.
I already had many of the ingredients on hand and purchased a nice cut of beef chuck roast during my weekly grocery visit so I thought I was prepared when I read the recipe again and it called for an entire bottle of red wine such as a Cote du Rhone or Pinot Noir!
My husband has a cellar but he wasn't parting with any of his wines to make this dish so on Thursday morning before the ETA of the snowstorm, I went to our local package store, Cask 'n Keg to search for a "cheap" bottle recommended by my husband.
I couldn't find the bottle he recommended but I did end up with 3 bottles of wine that I thought would suffice, meeting the criteria of "cheap". When I went to check out, I was telling the young man about my quandry and he said, "You're making beef bourguignon? My friend who also works here always uses this wine to make his beef bourguignon." And, he lead me to this:
The price was in my wheelhouse---$12.99 and it was a Kermit Lynch selected wine and a Cote du Rhone! I added it to my purchases. When I went home, I was met with my husband's approval, although he said he was about to send out a search and rescue team since I was taking so long.
Here is what the beef bourguignon looked like:
I did modify Ina's recipe a bit: No bacon (although I did use a huge dollop of bacon grease), no cognac, no frozen onions, added potatoes and forgot the parsley.
Most importantly, however, we did manage to consume an entire bottle of Cote du Rhone in the beef bourguignon, as well as a half a bottle of La Crema Pinot Noir on National Drink Wine Day.

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