July 1, 2017 Lunch – Santa Fe Vine and Wine Festival. Dinner – Common Fire

July 1, 2017 Lunch – Santa Fe Vine and Wine Festival. Dinner – Common Fire

We prepared a Chicken Salad, refreshed the artichoke Sauce (mayonnaise and fresh lemon juice), made a creamy tarragon vinaigrette (with olive oil, seeded mustard, white balsamic vinegar, two T. of fresh tarragon, about 1/3 cup of mayonnaise, and salt), Cucumber soup this morning for our long weekend in Taos.  Last night a Suzette made a blueberry and apricot cobbler and steamed a bunch of asparagus.

We nibbled as we prepped food for breakfast, packed, and left at 11:15 for Santa Fe Vine and Wine Festival at Las Golondrinas behind the race track, near a Sunrise Springs.  The Vine and Wine Society is the organization formed by the State wine makers to sell their wines directly to the public.  The wines are usually sold for below retail prices.  We tried lots of wines.  We particularly liked the Chenin Blanc and Chardonnay of Rossa Luna Winery, the Malbec and Tempranillos of Casa Avril, and of course the champagnes at Gruet Winery.  We bought five bottles of 2016 Tempranillo and one bottle of Rose from Casa Avril for $12.00 each, which is below the winery price.

Suzette packed a picnic basket with chicken salad, cherries, and the steamed asparagus marinated in the creamy tarragon vinaigrette and we drank glasses of Chenin Blanc from Rossa Luna.  I also enjoyed a taste of Gruet Sauvage Rose’ that is 100 Pinot Noir with no sugar added in the second dosage.

Our lunch was lovely.  We sat at one of the tables near the bandstand and listened, ate, and drank.  And then we danced a dance.  After lunch we picked up our wine and returned to the car.  Suzette was kind enough to drive us north the rest of the way to Taos, which allowed me the opportunity to doze a bit.

When we arrived at our apartment at 214 La Morada we unloaded and I took a two hour nap until 6:30.  We then discussed what to do for dinner and we decided to go to Common Fire out on the Ski Basin Road by Quail Ridge Tennis Club.

The menu was somewhat limited because everything is cooked in a wood fired oven.  We ordered a bottle of Chenin Blanc from Vouvray named Chateau de Montfort.  Here are some winemaker notes on the wine:
Chateau de Montfort Vouvray is an elegant, fine wine characterized by brilliant fruit aromas and excellent structure. Aromas of Granny Smith apples and Anjou pear dominate, with a hint of wet stone minerality. The initial fruit sweetness is perfectly complimented by a true zing of bracing acidity and minerality. The finish is long and satisfying, and the overall impression is of a tremendously refreshing wine.

We liked the wine, which the owner called a “Very representative Vouvray.”  I like the owner a lot.  He is a high energy guy and an ex-California wine dealer, who knows his wines.

We ordered Ba’Ssam, which is a Korean style dish. It included three leafs of Bibb lettuce filled with steamed rice flavored with a bit of Shiracha based Ssam sauce, garnished with a pile of pulled pork, some kimchi, and a dab of chopped green onion vinaigrette.  We had trouble picking dishes after that because many dishes were bread based.  We picked Merguez meatballs but the kitchen had run out of them, so we ordered a Ranch salad made with the lovely Bibb lettuce and a oven baked flatbread garnished with crumbled lamb Marquez, feta, black olive tapenade, and a yogurt sauce, which was really a fancy pizza made with a country style darker dough.  Suzette would not eat the bread so it was a bit of a waste.  We liked the salad of fresh greens.



We asked to sit at a table with a couple from Wichita Falls, a town in Texas near the Red River. They were very pleasant and told us about how they enjoy ordering food from Plated, which is a high end food delivery service.

We played a game of bocce on the bocce court while waiting on our flatbread.

The restaurant was very relaxing.  We sat on the patio, as did many other diners.

After dinner we drove to Smith’s and picked up a container of milk, an avocado, two Vine ripened tomatoes, some Hershey’s milk chocolate almond nuggets, organic plain yogurt, and coffee, plus a birthday card for Barry and a package of party poppers that explode in a shower of confetti, we hope.

We returned to the apartment at 9:30 for some much needed rest.

Bon Appetit