Buttered Salad?
I just sat through a wine video at winespectator.com — I don’t really know why, mainly because I paid them a babillion dollars for the privilege, and secondarily because it had the improbable title “Cooking For Wine”, which snazzily abbreviates to C4W. Cooking For Wine? I mean, I understand the occasional prestige bottle you want to build a meal around, but how many times in life does that happen? Isn’t Cooking For Wine the rough equivalent of Cooking for Corn on the Cob, or Remodelling For Your Stamp Collection? Who’s in charge here? So, you buy an expensive bottle of wine and all of a sudden it’s bossing you around? I say throw off the shackles! Cook for yourself and your loved ones! Drink the wine! Show it who’s boss. Well, anyhoo the video turned out to mostly be a simple one showing one how to make butternut squash risotto, and then there was this weird part at the end about making a vinaigrette for a salad with brown butter and lemon juice — presumably so it would go with Chardonnay, as will be revealed in the next episode. (Vinegar is a notorious wine-killer.) Mmm. Buttered salad. Guess that’s where you end up when you willingly surrender your sacred free choice and free will to a bottle of grape juice.
Just last night, I was reading a little booklet from Gourmet from 2006 where “Buttered Salad” was a recipe – I believe it was described as “delightfully light despite the butter”, or some such verbaige. I’m not jumping at the bit to try it -