A Taste of Tuscany, or Notes in a Symphony

Blue Duck Tavern
1201 24th St NW (24th and M St)
Washington DC
202-419-6755

In the play Amadeus, Salieri makes the realization that his nemesis, the great Mozart, composed his symphonies entirely in his head – with parts for the string and the wind and the percussion all written into a finished product before he even committed pen to paper. Whether this was true I do not know, but if it were then one can only imagine his excitement when transcribing these finished works of genius, as if he were unearthing, bit by bit, that which was already whole and complete. Replace one note, or remove one note; and the symphony would be diminished. That is sometimes how I feel about food – that on that rare occasion, everything comes together in a sumptuous fusion of taste and texture that to modify it would be to lessen it, and would be the most cardinal of sins. That is also how I feel, most of the time, about the best Brunello di Montalcino that I have had the fortune of tasting.

One of my first experiences with this fabled grape came two years ago at a restaurant out in Fairfax, VA called simply, 2941. That restaurant experience, while fabulous, is another story for another time. That night I had a bottle of 1997 Ciacci Piccolomini d’Aragona, and it was a moment of clarity. It was like someone had smacked me and I had to sit down – it was that good. I recently dug up some of the emails I had sent out the morning after that dinner – written in a frantic hand and with a messenger’s urgency – and in one particular communication I raved, “it was like drinking silk”. I described the wine to Morgan after the fact and joked that I would never be able to go back to Chianti again. He seemed very disturbed, and we laughed it off, but I must admit that ever since that day, I rarely order Chiantis any more.

Brunello is a variant of the Sangiovese grape, grown in the town of Montalcino in Tuscany, Italy. Most Brunello that I have had have been big, rounded wines – usually a deep red hue and with beautiful legs in the glass. They take a while to open up, but enough patience and the bouquet, usually very floral, soon opens up into a lush ensemble of flavours, emboldened by a strong tannic structure and an acidic tang that washes over the middle of your tongue. They are fruity, but the fruit is more an accent than a point of focus – and usually dark fruit – plums, cherries, blueberries, sometimes hints of chocolate. I feel, at least, that Brunello more so than any other grape I have tasted, stimulates all the areas of the tongue and is perhaps the most rounded, most complete wine drinking experience. For lack of a more elegant expression it is a Mozart symphony in your mouth, and swallowing seems like such a pity every time. Such a shame that they are so expensive; but I suppose you do get what you pay for.

But I digress. The DC contingent of my firm gathered for lunch recently to celebrate the end of a successful year, and I took the chance to suggest one of the restaurants I had been meaning to try for a while – the Blue Duck Tavern, a Foggy Bottom establishment in the corner of the Park Hyatt. Formerly Melrose, it had reopened last year under the stewardship of Brian McBride, and prides itself on being a contemporary American tavern, using American farm-grown ingredients and time-honoured techniques like roasting, braising, preserving and smoking in the preparation of wholesome American fare. RK had also promised to bring along a couple of bottles of his finest, so I had another reason to look forward to this.

I arrived on time – which is early by our company standards – and took the opportunity to invite myself on the grand tour. Alejandra, our gracious waitress who we would grow quite fond of throughout the meal, indulged me and walked me through the place. There were but a scattering of diners – it was lunch, after all – and the restaurant seemed pristine and unblemished, with a relaxing aura of decadence hanging about. The Blue Duck Tavern is, simply put, quite beautiful. Soaring ceilings and windows let in an abundance of natural light and enclose a space that is marked by lacquered brown marble, clean lines and – my favourite bit – concrete pillars for that Brutalist touch. The interior – designed by Tony Chi – was one of those which just plain made sense. You walked in and there was a natural order, a intuited path, a promenade that the gently sloping walkways led you down, past the pastry chef’s table with the gingerbread house, past the commis and cold stations, past the sprawling open kitchen – pausing to admire the wood oven at the end of the room – and finally to your table.

The open kitchen deserves further mention; I must have stopped for an eternity and gazed upon it in slack jawed amazement – and I was later able to wander through it once more, stopping to talk to the cooks. It was lunch time, so there was none of the hustle and bustle you normally associated with kitchens, but instead an almost pastoral scene of several smartly-dressed cooks moving, no, gliding about the gargantuan range briskly and wordlessly. The saucier hunched over his many bubbling pots, dipping, tasting, his mind surely whirling with the possibilities and permutations, oblivious to his audience. The most amazing bit was that it was all there, every last bit of the kitchen. Usually, open kitchens are small façades that hide the proper kitchen – where all the actual cooking gets done. It hurts to think about it, but the back is where all the dirty stuff happens, where chefs yell at their cooks Gordon Ramsay-style and grill-masters who are too hung-over to speak drop your steak on the ground, pick it up, and throw it back on the grill without so much as a second thought. This was not the case at the Blue Duck Tavern. Everything, soup to nuts – except perhaps the dishwashing station, was laid bare for all to see.

RK had brought three wines – and we decided to have a blind tasting of the three. The first was easy enough to place – a classic Bordeaux with a barnyard nose and hints of apple, still keeping strong in spite of its obvious age (we found out later that it was a 1986 Chateau L’Eglise-Clinet). It had begun to lose some of its colour but none of its lustre. It was a great start to the meal, and we were a good way through the bottle before our appetisers even arrived.

The next wine we had was a little fuller, fruitier and spicier, with less terroir. It turned out to be a Gaja Super Tuscan (Ca’ Marcanda Toscana Magari, 2004). It filled us with much anticipation to try the third and last wine, which was – after all had been said and done – our unanimous favourite out of the three. I don’t know how many bottles of Brunello RK has in his basement, but there is one less now. We had a 1997 Fanti, which was everything that a Brunello should be – big, strong, complex and yet so, so enjoyable. I would write about it, but my words would do it no justice.

The food itself was simply executed: I started with an heirloom beet salad, slippery and slivery with the right amount of vinaigrette and crumbly, melting goat cheese. The delightful twist to this dish was the addition of roasted spiced pumpkin seeds, which added a lovely crunch to each bite. Others at the table went with a pumpkin bisque with duck confit, a fall dish if there ever was one, and which I did not taste but was a lovely colour.

The entrees at the Blue Duck Tavern come in little serving bowls, which you do not eat off of. The greatly facilitates the sharing of food between people, and was heartening to see, for I grew up eating meals “family-style”, as it is known here. This name always amused me, for it was the only style I knew, so to give it a name seemed rather superfluous. In any case, the standout was the wild mushroom sauté – the chanterelles were first and foremost fresh; but also sweet and meaty and juicy and cooked perfectly. My brother does not eat mushrooms – he says that the texture puts him off – but I say that he is crazy. The perfect chanterelle – sautéd in a pat of butter and maybe some parsley – has just the right amount of resistance to the bite. Who could say no to seconds?

I personally ordered the venison sausage and sauerkraut which, while very good was not life-changing. It gave rise again to my eternal, internal dilemma – to order what I really want to eat, or to order what a restaurant is good at making? Most times I just order what I am in the mood for, which may or may not be a restaurant’s signature and while perfectly pleasing may not be the optimum dining experience. But sometimes the best dish at a restaurant may not be what you are in the mood for, so what, then? Damned if I know.

What I did know was that also on the table was the beef braised short ribs, which were excellent – perhaps a dash too much paprika but otherwise meltingly tender and succulent, with a deep, full flavour of spice and wine and other bone-warming ingredients. It was not cold out, and most certainly not in the restaurant, but I almost wished it had been. Who knew how much more orgasmic the combination of braised short ribs and Brunello might have been?

When it came time to go it was already the middle of the afternoon, on a Friday, no less – about that time when people stop working and kick back after a week’s exertions. We were not about to go back to work, and as we went our separate ways I knew in my heart of hearts what would be the perfect icing on the cake after a lunch of decadence – a long, wine-induced, mid-afternoon nap.