Scallops in Brillat-Savarin Sauce with NV Egly-Ouriet Les Vignes de Vrigny

It's a satisfying thing when you make a recipe you've been thinking about making for years and it turns out to be quite good, even when the concept made your body shiver.

Cheese sauce on fish? Really?

The recipe comes from Lincet. They make this cheese so they wouldn't toss out a recipe like this willy-nilly, you'd think.

Scallops substituted for sea bass because if this wasn't good, as least it wouldn't have been "We spent HOW MUCH ON THIS?" And rice milk substituted for cream, because we're dippin' our toe in lightly here. Cheese sauce and seafood isn't our bag, baby.

Big mound of pea shoots, snap peas and chervil. Scallops lightly seared. Cheese sauce with saffron drizzled over the top of everything (because Melissa Clark says cheeses like Brillat-Savarin and peas are besties). Pan con tomate to bring some carbs to the party.

The result was a delicate touch of Brillat-Savarin coming through in everything; the kind of flavor where you get the slight funky essence of this cheese in all its glory without feeling like you just bathed in it. Big winner. We were quite happy with this. Spring-like, refreshing, ample, and quite tasty.

Mrs. Ney isn't making it again. But for a recipe that won't be made again, this was happy stuff.

Served with our favorite Champagne, NV Egly-Ouriet Les Vignes de Vrigny ($48 - Binny's). 100% pinot meunier and 100% delicious, always. It took a few punches to the gut with this food, hollowing out a touch on the mid-palate, but bounced back on the finish with a rather complex farmhouse breeze taste to it. Nothing great in the pairing realm, but nice to have Champagne, though. Seemed like it had been too long.

Finished with tofu pudding (WTF?). Bittman thought the same thing until he made it, saying he wouldn't offer this recipe if it wasn't good. And it was. It's like spicy, deep, thick and rich pudding without the dairy "gack!"

One final note: Homemade ginger beer, from Saveur. "Pret-ay, pret-ay, pret-ay" damn good. And easy. Big fan.

#266 - Quebecois Cheese, Smoked Trout & Other Stuff With NV Egly Ouriet Champagne

Visual post. Delicious and fancy lunch with a Champagne that may have been the best yet.

Wine:  NV Egly-Ouriet Champagne Brut 1er Cru Les Vignes De Vrigny ($60 - Binny's)

100% Pinot Muenier, 30 months on lees, disgorged 7/10.

Something magical here.  Medium-bodied.  Nose of dried mesquite with buttercream and yeast.  Darker but not a particularly brooding or shy bubbly.  More confident and thoroughly expressive in what it wants to be.  Almost had a pinkish hue to it.  A smoked tangerine/pear fruit gives way rather quickly to buttercream, fennel and a fancy nutmeg spice that drove the ship, turning it drying and woodsy to finish in the best possible way.  Perfect acid, bubbles that kept everything in line and a great, pause-worthy finish where everything came together like a surprising and satisfying end to a great film.  Worth every cent.

Pairing:  89  Fine and dandy, best with the butter

Most complete with baguette and butter, making everything in the wine sing on cue.  A green apple and smoked trout bite brought every element in the wine to the front of the mouth party nicely while the cheese, a Duvillage 1860 product from the same Quebec cheese house that brought us Moondust, amped up a great funk in both.  Nice stuff together.  Would probably alter the food with this wine in the future, cuz we're definitely buying more of this stuff.