Le Boire Et Le Manger

This past week was my time to cook some French dinners. Well... if you consider twice enough times to consider it a whole week. Anyway, earlier this week, we decided to make a nice dinner of French onion soup and croque monsieur (which would be the exact first meal we had in Paris). The soup actually turned out terrific and I'm planning on having it again for lunch today. The croque monsieur was very good too, but I thought the soup was better. I had wanted to get a bottle of French Pinot Gris to go with this dinner, but my shopping options were limited and instead I bought a bottle of King's Estate Pinot Gris 2005, Oregon. I was very pleasantly surprised with this wine. When I was in the store and asked for a Pinot Gris, the wine-guy was like "well, we have the King's Estate," with an inflection like I should have known what he was talking about. Although I am trying to learn about wine, I know very little. I did know that Oregon made some good Pinot Gris, however, and figured I would give it a try. As I expected, it was a little more fruit forward than I had wanted, but it was still an excellent bottle of wine. It's got some fruity and floral scents with a lot of different fruits in the taste (citrus, pear, peach) and a little vanilla. The wine has some acidity, but not too much. I would buy this wine again.
Then, last night, I decided to make a Cassoulet. This is something I have been wanting to make for a while and have finally gotten around to it. We ate a cassoulet in Paris once and we loved it. So, I decided to try and make one at home. To be honest, it turned out terrific. Of course, the recipe made enough food to feed a small army, but I guess left-overs are always nice. For this meal, I went back to a wine I've enjoyed before - E Guigal Chateauneuf du Pape 2001. A little less than a year ago, I enjoyed a half-bottle of this while my wife was pregnant. I loved it so much, I went out and bought a full sized (750mL) bottle for us to share someday. I don't know if it was the particular bottle or just the wine aging over the year, but it wasn't exactly as I remember it. It was still fantastic and went very well with our dinner, but I remember it having more spice. This time it was a softer wine with more lush feelings. Still great though.

NP: Photograph, Def Leppard

Oh, Starbucks is giving away free t-shirts on this website: mystarbuckstshirt.com
It's happening every day until February 28th starting at 10:00 am PST (1:00 pm EST) until they run out for the day.
(You know... I've tried this for a couple of days and haven't gotten a shirt. The site says they run out quickly and to check back at 10:00 am PST the next day. I've done that and they are always out. I saw on another site you need to check at 7:00 am EST. Maybe that's the trick. Good luck if you're trying to get one.)