One of my co-workers recommended my husband I attend one of these special dinners held out at an orchard just outside our city. She said it would be right up our alley. I checked it out online and reserved two seats for Saturday, September 1st for our very first Supper in the Orchard.
Over the Hill Orchards and Winery is located just outside Regina on the way to Lumsden. Not a far drive at all, and very beautiful in the dusk. We arrived about an hour before supper was set to start at 6:30pm sharp. We "checked in", got our designated wine glasses with our choice of home-brewed beverage and found our seats.
The view was absolutely gorgeous and with the sun going down over the hills, you couldn't get a more picturesque Saskatchewan sun set than that. Albeit it was quite windy, it didn't ruin the mood or view.
We got a look at the menu before supper started, and my husband and I were anxious for it to start after we got a glimpse of what was going to being coming out of the kitchen for the remainder of the night. My husband even opted for the Wine Pairing option with his supper, which means he got a 2 ounce glass of wine that was paired to compliment each dish.
After a little chit-chat with our table-mates, we got an introduction to the whole affair from the hosts and owners of Over the Hill Orchards. The Supper in the Orchard events run from May to October and have being going on for three years. It is run in partnership with the Regina chapter of the Canadian Culinary Federation. Prominent chefs from all over the city partake in creating dishes for this culinary series and a percentage of the proceeds go to helping the federation mentor young chefs and send them to world-wide competitions.
Our chef for the evening was Jonathan Thauberger, the Executive Chef of Crave Kitchen+Wine Bar. He is distinguished as one of the best chefs in Canada and is a two time winner of the Gold Medal Plates competition.
Even though tomatoes are not a food I normally eat, this dish was fresh, colourful and flavourful. The balsamic pearls added a nice bite to the palette, but I felt the mozzarella could have been a little saltier. However that may have been due to it being made from buffalo milk.
This dish, although very flavourful and tasted good, was not one I could finish. I do not eat mushrooms; but I made sure to give it a couple good bites to get the flavour and texture so that I could accurately write about it. My husband graciously ate the rest for me. I'm not saying that I didn't like the dish, I very much liked the pickled mustard seed and the taste overall, I just don't eat mushrooms.
Terrine is not a common dish as it involves a lot of jelly to hold the ingredients together. This is not a texture and flavour profile that is common in North American so it was an almost exotic addition to the menu.
The smell proceeded this dish, and by the time it arrived we were all mouth-watering to get our forks into it. The shortrib was cooked so that it was falling apart with eat bite; and the polenta was cheesy and had the consistency of liquid-lava. Mix all the parts together and it was absolute perfection. I also enjoyed that the vegetable pearls were a little on the crunchy side, added a nice texture contrast to the rest of the dish that was so soft.
One of the vegetable pearls had everyone confused and it turned out to be zucchini! My husband said: "It's funny how you can really mess with your taste buds when food isn't in the shape that you're used to."
Dessert was a bit of a test for us and our table-mates. I was a bit skeptical of the blue cheese, but it turned out to be sweeter than I expected. The cherry sauce was made with basil and mint, which for me over-powered the local sour cherries. With the pannacotta being more on the savoury side because of the cheese, I feel the sauce didn't also need to be quite as savoury.
Overall the meal was absolutely fantastic and would 100% do again. In fact, we're already planning to go in Spring 2019 so we can try one of these excellent supper events with a different ingredient and flavour palette. I highly recommend one of these suppers to all my foodie friends out there. Definitely try one. (Phone and website information in the image below.)
No comments:
Post a Comment