My apologies for those who tuned in because of the title and were a little disappointed of the clean nature of my fantasy. This is, after all, a wine blog. And I’ll be honest, all my daydreams and night dreams right now, involve travel. It’s the one thing I’m really looking forward to when the world returns to some sense of normalcy. Whatever that new normal may look like.
Probably one of my favorite people in the world to travel with is my sister Jackie. We’ve done a few ‘sister’ trips, just the two of us, and I’ve also travelled with Jackie & her family. We’ve been to Florida, Hawaii, Aruba, Barbados, Bahamas, New Orleans, Mexico, and we’ve ziplined together in Haiti. And that’s been just a few of our destinations. I talk to my sister almost every day, she’s in Newfoundland, and right now I’m looking forward to the day I can visit her. We are both looking forward to our next trip.
The above picture was taken when we hit a Tropical storm in Aruba. It was pouring rain so we hit the cocktails. This was lunch, and we finished at 2 a.m. in the Casino. We are great travel partners. Hard to believe, but she doesn’t like wine.
What got me thinking of travel again? This past week Richard Arnold of Atlantic Tours & Travel, and I did a webinar to about 40 people on our upcoming trip to the Niagara region of Ontario for a wine tour. Right now, if its safe to travel, the trip is planned for October 2nd. If it’s still not safe to travel, we will do it in 2022.
It’s going to be a fabulous trip that includes Quebec City, Niagara Falls, wine tours and lots of laughs. Check out the full itinerary of our week long trip here.
So this was the scene on my deck last evening
It was a gorgeous sunny evening here and I was in the mood to cook.
I had all the essentials, olive oil, salt, pepper, my new recipe for molasses butter and my meat thermometer. Yes, I said molasses butter. One of my recipes last night was for a pork chop glazed with molasses butter (easy) and served with an apple bacon chutney. Oh. My. God.
The butter was easy. Melted butter, molasses, 2 cloves of garlic minced and brown sugar. A delicious glaze for pork, and I used it on a chicken breast too, which I have yet to eat.
The chutney wasn’t hard either. I chopped up some red onion, and I used my small cast iron frying pan on the grill, because I wanted to cook everything on the grill. You could do this on the stovetop. I just didn’t want to go back and forth between the grill and the stove.
I cooked the onions in olive oil till they were a little glazy and then I added my chopped up apple.
You let the apples cook down a little, you want them slightly soft. Once this is done, if you are using uncooked bacon, you would chop the bacon up and add it now. The apples, onion and bacon all cook together. I was using already cooked bacon, as I didn’t have a fresh pack of bacon, so I chopped it up in small pieces and added it last.
Season the apples with some cinnamon. (& nutmeg if you have it.) Then you add a little unsweetened apple sauce, apple cider vinegar, & brown sugar. The vinegar is very important as it will really balance the sweetness. This simmers for 20 minutes to let the apples get really soft and all the flavors marry together. I got this recipe from a Canadian chef, Spencer Watts, and you can get the full recipe with amounts here.
It was magical. Definitely one I’ll be making again. Let’s talk some wine.
If you’re wondering what I had in my glass for BBQ bonanza, it was this wine
The Menage a Trois red blend is a decadent red blend and the perfect BBQ wine. The blend consists of Merlot, Zinfandel and Cabernet Sauvignon, and on their own they are great BBQ wines. Put the 3 grapes together and boom, one of the best for grilled meat. A perfect love affair if you will. This wine is on sale right now in Nova Scotia, for under $17 a bottle. It’s regularly under $20, so still a great value.
The winery makes several white Menage a Trois wines including a Chardonnay and this Pinot Grigio, which we can get here.
This wine was given 91 Points and the Pinot Grigio is the perfect way to get a little fresh. 100% Pinot Grigio grapes, this wine seduces with a great balance of acidity and fresh fruit. Priced under $20, another great wine for enjoying on the patio this Summer.
I would like to say hi and issue a big welcome to all our new readers, especially those joining us last week from Ireland and Alaska. I hope you enjoy the wine journey.
Till next week, Cheers
Wine-It’s Just My Opinion 