Puente manages La Bodega Winery , the nation's first winery located inside an international airport. La Bodega has a cozy, intimate feel one would expect to find in a neighborhood place - and it's quite a neighborhood. DFW Airport is larger than Manhattan Island and is the connecting point for millions of travelers each year.

So what are the odds of making a love connection here? According to Puente, better than you'd expect.

One of the latest instances involved a man who, angry over missing his flight, walked in and ordered a petit syrah then struck up a conversation with a woman seated at the bar. The conversation lasted two hours until his next flight. A year later, Puente received an e-mail from the woman saying they were getting married and thanking the winery for "providing the perfect setting to meet the ideal life."

There are several reasons, Puente said, that people find love in the midst of a bustling airport. First, nothing pairs with wine like romance. Secondly, the winery does have its "regulars" who schedule their connections through DFW so they can spend time at La Bodega. And finally, it's not a bar setting - which makes women feel more comfortable.

"We're not a bar-like establishment with a loud TV, beer and spirits," Puente explained. "It's a place where you can have wine and a conversation."

Just a reminder that Texas wine is the perfect complement to Valentine's Day - and a winery tour makes a wonderful V-Day escape. Go to www.gotexanwine.org to plan your outing!
 
 

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Varietal Spotlight: Tempranillo

The name "Tempranillo" is a variation of "Temprano," Spanish for "early," an appropriate label since this black beauty ripens weeks earlier than most reds. Tempranillo is a full-bodied black grape with a thick skin used in making red wine. A native of Spain, the popular grape has embraced Texas hospitality - not surprising, since it likes warm weather and thrives in some of our higher-altitude appellations. Wine lovers are drawn to the ruby-red color and the flavors of blackberry, plum, cherry, tobacco, vanilla and oak. Pair a fine Tempranillo with steak, barbecue, hearty stews or spicy Mexican dishes. 
 

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Wine Trail Spotlight: Way Out Wineries

They call it the "middle" of Texas, a stretch that extends from west of the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex to the northern edge of the Texas Hill Country. It's an independent stretch of the state where the only thing valued more than self-reliance is a willingness to help your neighbor.

These seemingly contradictory attributes have come together seamlessly for the Way Out Wineries, a group of independent, boutique wineries united by geography and a relentless pursuit of quality.

"We don't have a natural tourism flow here like they do in some other parts of the state, so this is a valuable means of drawing people to our region," Pat Brennan, owner of Brennan Vineyards, one of eight wineries on the Way Out trail, said. "It's an opportunity to market ourselves both individually and collectively and try to support each other by maintaining a uniform level of quality. We count on each other. If a customer is unhappy with one winery, it reflects on all of us. But if we leave a good taste in someone's mouth, all the wineries benefit."

Way Out Wineries is part of the growing "wine trails" movement in Texas where a number of wineries in a particular geographic region join together to provide package tours, special events or group pricing for the traveling wine tourist. The Way Out Trail  - a name based on the fact that the facilities are "way out" from major metropolitan areas - was devised with the goal of getting visitors to see all eight wineries over a two-day period.

"It's an opportunity to go around and see some small, family-owned wineries that are off the beaten path. They're places you can go in and talk to the owner and the winemaker and get a lot of personalized attention," Brennan said.

In addition to Brennan Vineyards, Way Out Wineries includes Rising Star Vineyards, Barking Rocks Winery, Bluff Dale Vineyards, Alamosa Wine Cellars, Pillar Bluff Vineyards, Texas Legato Winery and Red Caboose Winery.

For more information, go to www.wayoutwineries.org. 
 

New to our panel this year is Tampa’s own Jeff Houck, who covers food life for the Tampa Tribune’s Baylife Magazine.  Jeff’s 'The Stew' won Best Blog for 2008. With a reputation for sacrilege, satire and spirited debate, Rum evangelist Capn Jimbo of The Rum Project brings his singular style to the tasting panel. Bill Dowd of Dowd on Drinks lends his expertise to the competition. Bill's column is distributed by the New York Times and Hearst news services throughout the US. Judges…start your motors ‘rumming’!

The Annual Rum Festival Main Event takes place at The RITZ Ybor on Saturday evening, March 28 from 6:30-10PM.  VIP hour begins at 6:30 with General Admissions beginning at 7:30. VIP guests receive Goody Bags, reserved seminar seating (while supplies last) and specialty cuisine with more in store.  Taste dozens of multiple-award winning rums from around the world such as Cuca Fresca Cachaca and their newest Ready To Serve Caipirinhas, Ron Botran, Blanco Aguardiente, Beleza Pura Cachaca, Khukri Rum from Nepal and more. A silent auction featuring rare and hard-to-find items will benefit the Sky Ranch Foundation.  Purchase Admissions Here

Guests of Polished Palate events have been bidding on items at our Silent Auctions benefiting the Sky Ranch Foundation since our first event and, while doing so, have added much needed funding for the outstanding rehabilitative work done at Sky Ranch For Boys.  The Foundation hosts fundraisers, such as the spectacular dinner generously hosted by Bacardi USA at their Headquarters in Miami last week. On March 1 in Las Vegas, in association with the American Beverage Licensees Convention and the very popular Nightclub & Bar Show, Sky Ranch hosts its 18th Annual Hall of Fame Dinner at the newly remodeled Monte Carlo Hotel & Casino

The Hall of Fame dinner honors those individuals whose personal and business achievements have made an important contribution to the united efforts of the alcohol beverage industry, providing quality care for the troubled teens at Sky Ranch for Boys.  This year’s honorees include Larry Ruvo, Southern Wine & Spirits of Nevada, Paul Houston, Beam Global Wine & Spirits, Ralph Levine, Metro NY Package Stores Association and Dori Bryant, Polished Palate.  This distinction sits at the top of of my achievements and could not have happened without the generosity of our guests, the spirits companies & the individuals who donate their resources. Thank you Sky Ranch supporters

We recently hosted a Spirits of Mexico Tasting at Chef Tom Pritchard’s 1200 Degree Roast held at the Coliseum in St. Pete.  Casa 1921 Cream won Best of Category at the Annual Spirits of Mexico Festival in San Diego 2008 and was a crowd favorite.  Corrido Cristalino combined exceptionally with Chef Tom’s very own spunky (understatement) Sangrita recipe and Corrido Extra Anejo languored nicely in the Corrido-supplied Riedel Stemware (both took home Gold Medals).  Del Maguey’s certified organic Crema de Mezcal is a departure from traditional Mezcal with its hint of agave syrup. Smokey yes, as one would anticipate, but with notes of vanilla and pear; along with that creamy texture, it WOW’d. Scorpion Mezcal 5 Year Special Reserva (Gold Medalist) didn’t stand a chance at the table 1 minute after the tasting ended as it was swept away to El Jefe Chef Tom! El Gran Jubileo’s Extra Anejo won a Platinum Medal and Top Agave Spirit at Tequila.net’s Agave Challenge 2008 and our guests agreed it is a well-deserved distinction.  Chef Tom is extraordinary in the least. Read about him in the St. Pete Times: January 11  January 18  January 21

Join Davidoff & sip exceptional Guatemalan Rums celebrating the Grand Opening of Cigar Inn Midtown NYC on Saturday February 7 from 8-10PM. Info 212-750-0809

The University of Tampa Board of Counselors 2nd Annual Cigar & Mojito Social takes place Friday evening February 27. For info call Lisa Rorrer at 813-257-3582

Interactive menus have been around for a few years. They have until recently involved placing a touchpad device on a table and having diners push buttons to see a menu and order food. These type installations seem popular in Japan. And Bytes restaurant in Canterbury, England started a touch screen menu in 2006. Bytes’ menus are at the tables as stand-alone panels, but are not integrated into the tabletop.

Adour, the upscale restaurant in New York’s St. Regis hotel, features a small wine bar with a bar top that provides touch screen menus to obtain information about wine offerings.

The uWink restaurant chain was started in California by the creator of Atari and Chuck E. Cheese, Nolan Bushnell. uWink has computer touchscreen-type devices placed at the tables that allow you to order, customize your order, and get nutritional information about your meal. After you place your order, you can play video games, take surveys or watch movie trailers while waiting for your food. uWink plans to expand into the South Florida area in the next year, so keep a lookout.

These are nice developments, but the interactive menu that really got us interested was found at Inamo, an Oriental fusion restaurant and bar in London’s West End. Inamo has taken the interactive menu a step further, making it truly a “tabletop” menu. Inamo’s interactive tabletop menu system uses projectors located above the tables to project images onto the tabletops in front of diners. The tabletop is actually a touchscreen device. Patrons touch the tabletop to activate the menu. A list of food and drink offerings appears, along with photos of each. Touching the picture of a dish enlarges the photo and gives details of the food. Touch an “Order This” button and the order is sent to the kitchen, cooked and delivered to your (very smart) table.

But wait, there’s more! Inamo allows you to choose from seven different (virtual) tablecloths, so you can set your own mood. And not only can you play games on the tabletop, you can use them to get information about the neighborhood and even call a cab. Can using these to encourage social interaction between patrons be far behind? A My Space in the real world?

Inamo was designed by English architectural firm Blacksheep, and is the brainchild of entrepreneurs Danny Potter and Noel Hunwick. The duo offers customers high-quality Asian fusion cuisine, with an emphasis on allowing patrons to customize their own dining experience via the tabletop interfaces.

All this technology is fun, but do you worry you’ll be treated like one of those annoying automated telephone menu systems? Not to worry, waiters are nearby and you can call one from your tabletop.

Will this technology eventually make waiters a thing of the past? We’re not for sure, but it could decrease the number of waiters needed. One thing that is for sure, the mechanical workings of restaurants may have been stable for 800 years, but they are changing now. Touchscreen tabletops, choosing your own virtual tablecloths, calling a cab on your table. What’s next, some exotic new-fangled menu items, maybe a saki mojito? Oh . . . seems it’s already on Inamo’s menu.

The competition for the coveted title was held over two days, August 2nd and 3rd, at New Orleans’ Morial Convention Center. Each state was represented by a chef who either won his state’s Seafood Cook-Off, or was appointed by his state’s governor. The chefs were required to use fresh seafood from their state as the main ingredient.

This was the fifth annual Great American Seafood Cook-Off and the best so far, according to Harlon Pearce, Chairman of the Board of the Louisiana Seafood Promotion and Marketing Board, the producer of the event. “The purpose of the Cook-Off is to showcase our exceptional domestic seafood and to showcase the talents of our finest chefs,” said Pearce. As someone who wears his bias toward Louisiana chefs proudly, Pearce was quick to point out that Chef Currence was actually born in New Orleans, and “we just lent him out to Mississippi.”

The top-level sponsors of the Cook-Off were NOAA and FishWatch (a division of NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service, which oversees our nation’s fisheries. FishWatch’s website provides consumers with information on sustainable seafood), Michelob Brewing Company, Shell, Southwest Airlines, and Southwest Cargo. Next year’s Cook-Off is already being planned, and according to Pearce it will be “bigger and better than ever.”

The Gulf coast was well represented in this year’s Cook-Off. Mississippi sent the winner, Chef Currence, from the City Grocery Restaurant Group in Oxford, and his assistant, Chef Heath Johnson. Texas sent Mark Holley of Pesce Restaurant in Houston, assisted by William Thompson, while Louisiana sent Brian Landry from Galatoire’s Restaurant in New Orleans, assisted by Chef Heather Young, and Florida sent Andre Bienvenu of Joe’s Stone Crab in Miami Beach, assisted by Chefs Andy Saint Agnes and Hector Lopez.

The Master of Ceremonies was Chef John Besh, the 2004 King of American Seafood, and the James Beard Award winner for Best Chef of the Southeast in 2006. Besh founded four of New Orleans’ finest restaurants, Restaurant August, Besh Steak, Lüke and La Provence. Restaurant August was one of the first restaurants to reopen after hurricane Katrina, and has been named as one of the top 50 restaurants in the nation by Gourmet magazine.

Day one of the Cook-Off saw all fifteen chefs preparing a seafood dish of their choice. The starting time for each chef to begin cooking was staggered, with a new chef starting every fifteen minutes. The judges therefore received a new dish every fifteen minutes; this ensured each entry was still piping hot when it was judged. Each chef had an hour and a half to complete the dish, plate it and present it to the judges. Marc Jones, a fishing industry consultant, was the Timekeeper; an enforcer who kept a stopwatch on each competitor so no one went over an hour and a half. The tension was visible on the chefs’ faces as the clock ticked down while they scrambled to pull everything together. Several chefs’ sighs of relief were audible to the crowd when they finished in the nick of time.

Chef Besh kept the large crowd entertained with his sharp wit and good-natured taunting of the competitors. He would hover near the chefs who were on the clock, looking over their shoulders and describing the actions to the crowd. His explanations of how a chef was preparing a dish were both enlightening and hilarious. At one point, he tried to instigate a trash talking battle between the chefs from North Carolina and Kansas, but neither chef fell for his taunts, preferring to laugh along with the crowd at the obvious ploy.

Besh, being a Louisiana native, played up the hometown advantage enjoyed by New Orleans native Brian Landry of Galatoire’s, who took second place in the Cook-Off. Friends and family of Landry were numerous and vocal. Did the supporters help, or did that just put more pressure on Landry? “Oh, they definitely helped. Knowing they were here to support me made me more relaxed,” said Landry.

The chefs prepared a plate for each of the six judges, two more plates for a display area that allowed the crowd a close look, and another plate for media tasting backstage. (Being in the media has its moments).

The judges had the envious job of tasting each of the fifteen dishes. They also had the not so envious job of picking five dishes as the best of the day. The top five were determined on a points system, where each dish was given a numeric grade. Those five chefs were the finalists, and returned on day two to battle each other for the title.

At the end of day one, with all the chefs onstage, the finalists were announced. Three of the five were Gulf Coasters: Currence, Holley and Landry. The other two were Tafari Campbell, two-time winner of the Maryland Seafood Cook-Off, from the Chevy Chase Club, and Paul Anders of Colorado, from Sweet Basil Restaurant in Vail.

Chef Andre Bienvenu from Joe’s Stone Crab, whose first day dish featured Florida lobster, stone crab and shrimp, was disappointed he didn’t make the final cut, but said he has learned, after competing in many cook-offs, “Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. You just have to have fun.” There was a miscommunication on the rules about when he could send his plate to the judges, “So my lobster ended up being overcooked. The judges said everything else was great.”

One comment heard over and over from the chefs was how well everyone got along. “I enjoyed all the chefs around me. Everyone was very polite, very respectful. No one bragged about how great they were,” said Bienvenu.

Day two had a different format. The chefs were split into two groups. The finalists were on one side of the arena, while the remaining ten chefs were on the other.

While the finalists were cooking up their entries on day two, the other ten chefs returned and gave the crowd a treat. Each chef cooked up a dish that was served to the audience. Dishes from Alaska razor clams to Florida snapper and stone crab were generously dished out to all who wanted. Day two also started with Chef Besh bringing out another M.C. to accompany him, Charmaine Neville, head of the Charmaine Neville Band, and member of New Orleans’ legendary first family of funk, the Nevilles. Charmaine regaled the audience with her down home New Orleans stories and her folksy charm.

On the other side of the auditorium, the five finalists had to prepare a home-style dish that was both nutritious and practical for any home-cook to prepare. In addition, there was an Iron Chef type element: mystery ingredients not revealed to the chefs until immediately before the start of day two’s cooking. The mystery ingredients to be used were as follows: a choice of one of three different Michelob beers, and peanuts (in honor of sponsor Southwest Airlines, of course).

Chef Holley was the first chef up. He decided on cooking Texas Gulf shrimp deglazed with tequila, with tomato relish, prickly pear gastrique, black beans, and hominy arepas.

Next up was Chef Landry, who assembled a Shrimp and Andouille Cassoulet, using Louisiana shrimp and andouille sausage, which was smothered in a white bean casserole.

Following was Chef Campbell, who presented Pan Roasted Glazed Rockfish with Peas and Carrots, which included a sauce combining veal sauce, red wine and mushrooms.

Chef Currence then made his North Mississippi Courtboullion with Seafood Dirty Rice, using fresh Gulf shrimp, Mississippi redfish, and Gulf crabmeat.

The final entry was Chef Anders’ creation of Colorado Striped Bass Panzanella with crispy eggplant.

Each of the dishes was gorgeously presented (and mighty tasty). Each of the finalists’ score from their day two dish was combined with the score from day one to decide the King of American Seafood. In the end, Chef Currence’s Courtboullion carried the day, making him the 2008 King of American Seafood. He was presented with a crown worthy of his title, which was placed upon his head by Chef Besh. The crown proved to be a little awkward, as it kept trying to fall off. Chef Currence tried to take it off and just hold it by his side, but each time he did, the crown was immediately placed back atop his head by the other chefs or the admiring audience. Such are the burdens of royalty!

Starting from 10,000 yen (about $100 U.S dollars) per day, the admission covers multiple lectures and demonstrations by prominent chefs from around the world, cooking shows using the latest tools and Japanese cuisine tastings. The featured chefs will represent various culinary fields such as French, Italian Spanish and Japanese.

Guest Chefs Include:

France:  Joël Robuchon, Pierre Gagnaire, Jacques Puisais, Bruno Menard, Hervé This
Spain: Ferran Adrià, Juan Mari Arzak, Andoni Luis Aduriz, Grant Achatz, Nobuyuki Matsuhisa
Italy: Massimiliano Alajmo
UK: Heston Blumenthal
Australia: Tetsuya Wakuda
Japan: Kunio Tokuka and Seiji Yamamoto.

Tokyo has always been known for an array of fine restaurants and cuisine with an emphasis on seasonality of food, quality of ingredients and presentation. Sushi, tempura, oden, soba, yakitori and unagi are just a small sampling of the Japanese diet. These foods have earned worldwide acclaim as healthy and popular cuisine.

For more information on this unforgettable culinary experience, please visit tokyotaste.net/.