Next to Italian food, it is safe to say that our family, especially our girls Gina & Lisa, are immensely fond of Asian cuisine. The newest addition to the Asian scene in Montclair is the above-mentioned Mei’s Café, and what an addition it is. Chef/owner Mei-Mei-La is awing her customers with Pan Asian cuisine specializing in dumplings, noodles, & rice dishes. These are authentic, homemade items that will have you licking your chopsticks. I suggest you start with a selection from the more than 10 dumplings on the menu, including daily specials like Shrimp & Pineapple Dumplings. And what’s more you may order these dumplings fried, pan-fried, steamed or in soup (Bonito broth). Each preparation has its own character, but I must admit that those in soup are my favorites, especially when the soup is the bath for her remarkably light & wonderfully spicy Shrimp & Jalapeno Dumplings.
On this occasion we began with pan-fried Pork & Cabbage Dumplings, Steamed Vegetable Dumplings, Steamed Beef & Jalapeno Dumplings and of course my favorite, Shrimp & Jalapeno Dumplings in soup. The dumplings are served with 3 sauces, mild, medium and a seductively hot Jalapeno sauce. We also savored spiced to perfection Chicken Satay and Wasabi Crab Cakes.
Main courses, which are the equal to the dumplings, consisted of Pad Thai, that my daughter Gina said was the best she ever had; Orange Teriyaki Chicken that my daughter Lisa could not stop raving about. Receiving the same accolades from the rest of our group was Sambal Chicken, a wonderfully spicy chicken dish; Clay Pot Garlic-roasted Cod; Clay Pot Pepper Steak and Basil Fried Rice with Chicken. Even the grandkids got into the act, enjoying Chicken with Mixed Vegetables in a brown sauce.
Mei describes her café’s décor as minimalist & contemporary. It is a large open space with food the star. Less successful is the service, which I am sure will improve with time.
We enjoyed two outstanding and two good wines, which I opened in unison as preferences at the table varied. Since it was Carol’s birthday one of the wines was her favorite, 2009 Ceretto Arneis Blange. Arneis is a white grape variety found in the hills of the Roero in Piedmont, Italy. The Ceretto Arneis is crisp and refreshing on the palate, has a bit of a spritz to it on opening and consistently good. $25. Available at most wine shops.
The two other whites we enjoyed were Vouvrays from the Alsace region of France. Chenin Blanc is the grape in these beautifully crafted wines and I am completely enamored by it, especially when it is made by two of the region’s best producers. We started with a 2005 Philippe Foreau Vouvray Demi Sec Clos Naudin. This is a beautifully made wine. It exhibits elegance and perfect balance. The wine just soars in the glass and has a sumptuously long finish. It is still very young with a long life ahead. Not easy to find, but if you do it will be well worth the $43 price tag.
The other Vouvray was a 1985 Huet Clos du Bourg Moelleux 1ere Trie. What a magnificent wine. I wrote about this particular wine in my initial blog about my most memorable wines of last year. This bottle was once again memorable. If you did not know this wine was 26 years old, you would think it was years younger, not unlike my lovely wife Carol. On the nose it is a refined beauty with a marvelous complexity of fruity aromas. On the palate it is completely balanced, round and pure with a slight hint of botrytis and a long and sensual finish. This is a wine that lets you truly experience what wine can be about when made by a master. As we did not finish the bottle, I took it home, re-corked it and put it in my fridge. I finished it 3 days later and it was still crisp and pure. It had lost very little. 56º Wine, Bernardsville, NJ. $85
My son-in-laws prefer red wine, so I brought a 2003 Beaurenard Chateauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Boisrenard. A nice CDP if you like the more modern style of these wines that many CDP producers have moved towards the past few years. Here they combine tradition with modern techniques that produces a more extracted and higher alcohol (14.9%) wine than the traditionalists. $60
Please note that the wine glasses here are very small, so if you are bringing a good wine that really needs the proper glass to be appreciated you would be wise to bring your own glasses.
Since the kids were getting a bit antsy, we moved the celebration to our house and serenaded Carol with the traditional "Happy Birthday".
Until next time,
Saluté
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