November 25, 2021 Thanksgiving Brunch at Warwick Hotel - Cured Salmon Platter and Texas Omelette. Dinner at BIlly and Elaine’s house

November 25, 2021 Thanksgiving    Brunch at Warwick Hotel - Cured Salmon Platter and Texas Omelette.  Dinner at BIlly and Elaine’s house

At 9:30 we walked four or five blocks to Childer’s Bakery but it was closed, as was every other restaurant along the way so we returned to the hotel bar, where breakfast was being served.

Suzette drank coffee and ordered a Texas Omelette which was beautifully fluffy eggs wrapped around slices of house-made chorizo, bell peppers, cheddar cheese, and tomato salsa with a side of country style baby red potatoes.  I ordered the smoked salmon platter turned out to simple be a toasted bagel spread with a generous layer of cream cheese and garnished with a generous amount of Gravad lax, minced red onion and egg and dotted with large capers.

Pictures to follow

It looked great and tasted just like my usual bagel at home, except this was a regular bagel instead of a wheat bagel I ordered a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice that was quite lovely.

After breakfast when we returned to our room the housekeeping person was making it up so we grabbed a book and returned to the spacious lobby and found a seat on a couch by the southern windows with warm sunlight and read for 1/2 hour to let the housekeeping finish.

We then returned to our room and rested for a while, then got dressed and drove to BIlly and Elaine’s at 2:30.

When we arrived the leaves that had fallen were so beautiful that I decided to take a walk to see more of the fallen leaves, but we were interrupted by Mickie handing us glasses of Billoncort Salmon Rose champagne, so we sipped and toured the progress in the kitchen.

We then moved the car to the street to make space for Rita to navigate the stairs and then walked west several blocks to a group of trees with vividly colored leaves and back.  I was feeling better by the time we returned.

We talked and watched the Cowboys play the Raiders until Jerry and Marion arrived with the turkey, a wild rice dressing, a lovely delicata squash dish, and cranberry chutney.

BIlly was still basting the beef tenderloin and baking Mother’s spinach soufflé as Jerry sliced the turkey.  When Jerry finished carving the turkey and BIlly removed the soufflé from the oven, we all served ourselves and I poured the Bottle of Herman Weimer BVG biodynamic Riesling and BIlly had opened a bottle of the 2016 De Ponte Dundee Hills Pinot Noir.

Everything tasted wonderful. I took second helpings of the tenderloin, the wild rice dressing, and spinach soufflé.  I could feel Mother’s hand through the spinach soufflé in a deja vu recollection of that same soufflé as she made it, the same way the food critic in the movie Ratatouille has a deja vu recollection of his mother’s ratatouille when he tastes the mouse’s ratatouille.

We drank both bottles of Pinot and only one of the rieslings, perhaps because everyone was enjoying the tenderloin so much.

The Riesling was a very tightly merging of fruit and acidity.  The only other similar wine was a Trimbach special Riesling, which was considered a once in a generation wine.  Apparently, the tightness of the sweet and acid is a characteristic that is appreciated by the few, because I did not appreciate it with either the Trimbach or in this Weimer Riesling., nor did anyone else.

All I can say is that in most rieslings one is pulled by the sweetness or the acidity and sometimes by both, but with these special bottles the two are so tightly merged that the wine becomes simply a pleasantly drinkable wine.

Everyone saved room for dessert because Rita is famous for her pecan pie.  She said this one was over baked but I loved the heavily. toasted pecans on top and the rather stiff Caro syrup and brown sugar filling.  Rita suggested a dollop of whipped cream, so I went to the kitchen and with Billy’s help whipped 1 1/2 cups of heavy cream, a few drops of vanilla extract, and about 1/2 T. of granulated sugar into soft mounds of whipped cream in a matter of minutes. I ate several pieces of pecan pie.  Rebecca made a chocolate pecan pie and Elaine made a pumpkin pie.

The bottle of Burgundy Marc was still beside the table, so we shared the last of that bottle.  Billy poured Suzette a glass of XO cognac.

We then regrouped in the TV room and watched the-last six minutes of the Cowboy’s game and overtime, in which the Raiders prevailed by kicking a field goal to win 36 to 33.

Everyone in the room agreed, it was a good game.

We left around at 7:30 and returned to our room by 8:00.

We watched a Poirot episode and drifted off the sleep but awakened at 12:30 as our stomachs were working overtime to digest dinner.  Suzette fell back asleep, but I blogged and went back to bed at 2:00.

Bon Appetit