Homemade dinner with Chardonnay

On April 14, 2013, Oscar, Joan and I made a home made dinner to pair with Chardonnay. This idea came about because we didn't want to spend so much money on a dinner. So I did the research on the types of wines and what would taste good with a certain type of wine. I found a page on Pinterest that gave a lot of good pairings as well as the recipes for the dishes. Here is the link is anyone wants to use it http://pinterest.com/sutterhome/food-wine-pairing/
The website is specific to Shutter Home wines but I'm sure that any brand would work. So we chose to make baked zucchini chips as the appetizer and the main course was shrimp pasta with tomatoes, lemon, and spinach and this was to be paired with Chardonnay.

Shrimp Angel Hair Pasta with spinach, lemon, and tomato 

Baked Zucchini Chips

The way we decided was by just choosing a wine first and then searching for the best food pairings through the website.  We chose the Canyon Road Chardonnay that we tried at the Vintage cellar because it was a really good Chardonnay when we tried it. 

Canyon Road Chardonnay
California 2011
"This Chardonnay has crisp Fuji apple flavors with slightly sweet aromatics and hints of brown spice and ripe lime in the mid to late palate."

Our meal

We had some difficulty opening the wine at first. Joan was the one that figured out how to open it correctly but Oscar was the one that knew how to pour it correctly. As for me, I just made the dinner :)

Struggling before Joan took the wine

Joan using her skills to open the wine

Oscar being a pro at pouring wine

 Trying the dinner with the wine wasn't that much fun for me this time around. My allergies were acting up really badly and I couldn't taste a lot of the foods. The only things I could really taste were the bitterness, spiciness, and the saltiness of the food and nothing else. Everything just tasted bitter, salty, or spicy. Having it with the Chardonnay only made the food more salty, spicy, and bitter. I ate a semi burnt zucchini chip and it was the most bitter thing I've ever tasted. When I had a semi burnt zucchini chip before it wasn't too bitter but the wine made the flavor come out that much more and it was so disgusting. And then I made the mistake of putting more red flake peppers on my noodles and it made my entire mouth burn and sting after I had the wine. Worst mistake of the night.

The deadly pepper flakes in front of my noodles.

 I wish I could explain more of the taste of the wine and food pairing but I just couldn't taste anything with how my allergies were acting up. Maybe next time around it'll be better.