Don't Cry Over Spilled Wine

Sometimes childhood dreams do come true.

I have no doubt that at some point a sweets-lover like me wished for a dinner of all desserts.

Surprise, surprise, tonight it finally happened.

The place was Amour Wine Bistro for a five course dessert and wine pairing menu created by Amour's chef Rob Hamlin and Veronica Perez of Petites Bouches, the source of RVA's best macaroons..

How over the top does that sound?

We took our assigned seats and soon met the couple who would be our dinner partners for the evening.

Our server offered us a Kir Royale, but we declined.

The guy at the table next to us did the same, putting it succinctly, "No, I can't. Last time I had five courses here, I left toasty."

Yea, that.

And then we began the slow ascent from savory to sweet.

The first course was a pear soup with goat cheese fritters and a Normandie Cidre Bouche de cru "Duche de Longueville."

Owner Paul clarified that this was not cider for kiddies, saying, "Of course it has alcohol. Everything in France has alcohol."

I'd had the cider before (for brunch with a crab crepe) but never had it in the traditional presentation of a stoneware mug, which did make a difference.

The soup was thick and fruity and everyone was understandably enamored of the fried goat cheese fritters.

Next came a fois gras creme brulee, easily the most unique dish of the meal.

It was served with an Alsace Gewurztraminer "Pierre Sparr 2008," a spicy wine that paired beautifully with the richness of the foie gras.

After a course involving liver, we naturally needed a palate cleanser.

Faux vanilla parfait with chocolate sauce looked the part in a skinny cordial glass but was really Parmesan whipped cream with a balsamic reduction.

It definitely quieted the room as everyone tried to figure out what it was.

The prize for largest dessert of the evening went to a vanilla tart facon Pierre Herme, a decadent disc of vanilla-infused mascarpone atop vanilla and rum-soaked ladyfingers and finished with a white chocolate glaze.

The mascarpone was so exquisitely flavored that it didn't even require something underneath although the ladyfingers were a big hit with the men at the table.

Given its size, we took our time eating it with a white Vouvray Moelleux "Le Margalleau" 2009, a late harvest gem with a delicate sweetness.

By this time, the full restaurant was well-lubricated and snippets of conversation began drifting our way.

My vote for the funniest goes to the table behind us, where I heard, "It was a lot like Barcode, but not as tragic."

I immediately knew exactly what he meant.

We had another palate cleanser, this time a Sauternes sorbet and an extremely creative way to combine dessert and drinking.

Passion fruit mille feuilles was a take-off on the classic mille feuilles dessert.

A passion fruit cream was layered between puff pastry and accompanied by mango jellies.

We savored its tangy flavors with a sweet Muscat de Rivesaltes "Chateau de Caladroy" 2010.

The menu had been vague about the last course, other than to say it would be "something impressive for the eye and taste buds."

If that sounds grandiose, it was also spot on.

A parfait glass came looking like a piece of modern sculpture.

At the bottom were Barona chocolate pearls.

Halfway up the glass was a Valrhona cocoa-dusted housemade marshmallow with a chocolate-coated pretzel twig speared  through it for easier retrieval.

Further up was a disc of hardened chocolate the exact width of the glass.

On top of that  was raspberry puree (which was released when we broke the disc) and whipped cream.

It was the dessert that elicited the most oohs and ahhs.

With it we drank Beaujolais Villages "Joseph Drouhin" 2009, a dry, refined and silky red perfect for the chocolate we were inhaling.

By this point in the evening, no one was feeling any pain and we heard a crash as someone lost control of his wine glass.

Did the clumsy/inebriated one break stride eating his chocolate?

He did not.

As he continued his assault on it, the person across the table from him reached over and began sopping up the spilled wine while the spiller continued eating.

Did anyone fault him for this?

We did not.

When you finally get your youthful wish for five courses of dessert, what's a little spillage?

Childhood dreams can come true
It can happen to you

Let me warn you, though, you'll be in a food coma afterwards.

But once you can move again, you'll know.

It will have been well worth it.

I Will If You Will

My timing was impeccable tonight.

A friend had suggested we have dinner at Six Burner and since I had no definitive plans, I agreed.

Food? Yes, sir!

We're fairly well matched in terms of our food taste, so it's usually a good time when we dine together.

With the raucous Tech fans screaming across the street at Home Team Grill, I found an oasis of calm when I walked into Six Burner.

My friend soon arrived, commented on my parking job and suggested libations. I started with Broadbent Vinho Verde and he had a vodka martini (sorry, purists).

Chef Philip had several interesting offerings (hello braised honeycomb tripe) so we ordered deviled eggs with ham to tide us over while we perused the menu.

Friend is a deviled egg fanatic and I probably haven't had one in five years, so we came at these eggs from wildly different perspectives.

We both loved them with a capital "L"; their peppery sass with just the right amount of thin-sliced ham elevated them to so much more than a picnic side dish.

Next up was house smoked eel with local muscadine grape unagi-style sauce, wasabi peas and sesame powder over local lettuces.

Our libations long gone, we got a bottle of 2002 Domaine du Viking Vouvray Cuvee Aurelie, a rich and slightly sweet golden-colored wine with an incredibly long finish.

It met its match in the foie gras-stuffed pig's foot with roasted red pepper and roasted eggplant sauce that followed.

Sadly, I couldn't talk him into the tripe (but then he doesn't like lentils, either, so he's far from perfect) so we had the Rappahannock oysters.

The selection of Old Salts, Stingrays and Witch Ducks came with a blueberry mignonette but my friend insisted on also getting a more traditional tarragon mignonette, only to prefer the blueberry.

As an ex once told me, it's not just a woman's prerogative to change her mind.

We closed out the meal with chocolate mousse although I was tempted by the house-made waffles with roasted peaches.

The problem was that I'd had a peach earlier today and my allergy probably wasn't going to allow for two in one day without my tongue blowing up like an eggplant.

I wasn't going to push it because I now had plans after dinner.

The girlfriend with the visiting boyfriend had called just before I left and invited me to join them for an after-dinner drink at Amour.

"Call first to make sure we're still there," she'd foolishly suggested. Call? As if.

How about I come by and if you guys are already gone, I'll just enjoy myself at Amour without you?

But there they were in the front window enjoying the last of their dessert and cheese plate, so I pulled up a chair.

Magically a glass of Lucien Albrecht Brut Rose, a personal favorite, arrived and my friend offered me a bite of her dark chocolate creme brulee (to-die-for good).

They told me about their day exploring Richmond, stopping at the Jefferson and Maymont, as they biked around the city.

I heard tales from the VMFA Richard Branson party the night before and raves about their meal and pairings at Amour that night.

Next on their agenda was Stella's because it was on their way home and they tried to convince me to join them there.

Awkward.

All I could think of was that if my out-of-town boyfriend was finally visiting RVA, I wouldn't want to share him with my talkative friend all evening.

I begged off and they went on their way just as a girlfriend walked through the door of Amour.

This was turning into a seamless sort of an evening.

She was coming in for a glass of wine, so I decided to stay for some girl talk and perhaps more wine.

We moved to the bar in the back, out of the glare of the bustle of Carytown on a Saturday night.

Sometimes you want to see, sometimes to be seen and sometimes neither.

As if Brut Rose and an unexpected friend weren't treats enough, owner Paul brought over a plate of little multi-colored macarons for our sampling pleasure.

They were from Petites Bouchees, a local company that's giving Richmonders a taste of a classic French cookie one small bite at a time.

I tasted chocolate with espresso butter cream, hazelnut with slated butter caramel, pistachio with bittersweet chocolate, and almond with passion fruit milk chocolate as we chatted.

We moved on to Lucien Albrecht Blanc de Blancs Brut to accompany our macaron fest

Every now and then, I'd stop and ask myself if I really needed to eat another bite and usually the Brut convinced me that I did.

The later it got, the more we kept on talking, both of us savoring the unexpected pleasure of meeting up.

I knew my dinner companion was long asleep and hopefully the lovebirds were reveling in each other's company, so I'd totally lucked out in running into a friend with her late evening free.

Recently a friend complimented me on my busy-ness and I'd made the comment to her that "Anyone could do what I do." She'd insisted that most people didn't have my stamina.

Hell, I'm thinking stamina feeds on things like Alsatian bubbles, macarons and unexpected friends.