I was part way into making the recipe for Pacific Crab Salad from the California Winemakers book circa 1963 for last night’s dinner, when 2 things occurred to me. One was they didn’t have the selection in the grocery stores of pre-made ingredients back then, and the other was they felt wine had to go IN to each recipe, whether it improved the concoction or not.
I found myself making seafood cocktail sauce with white wine in it for this salad. I had a container of lovely seafood cocktail sauce in the fridge already that I had bought at Smart & Final. So here’s my amended recipe, replacing the first 7 ingredients (chili sauce, horseradish, lemon juice, garlic, green onion and dill) with 1/2 cup of store bought cocktail sauce. Put the 1/2 cup white wine the recipe tells us to put in the sauce, in a glass and drink it. Toss the crab with the sauce, put on a bed of lettuce and garnish with hard cooked egg wedges, tomatoes, and black olives. Serve with crusty bread and some more crisp white wine. I used Hawk Watch 2009 Vortex.
I skipped cooking lunch for my friend Vivianne today as I’d planned, and took her to Jeremy’s on the Hill in Wynola. This is a lovely high-end gourmet restaurant at a small widening in the road on the way to Julian. I had their Lobster Bisque and a Julian Apple & Candied Walnut Salad. I’m making the Baked Chicken Californian for dinner this evening from the antique cookbook. It calls for 1/4 cup of California Sherry which I plan to put in the recipe, as well as an equal amount in the cook’s wine glass.
Au revoir mes amis,
Elaine