Restaurant Review: Ming Tsai's Blue Ginger Wellesley

Maybe it was because the first time we ate there we'd just closed on our house in Wellesley, but I've always thought of Blue Ginger as being a very expensive restaurant. So the other day when we skated out of there for$38 (tip included!) after a thoroughly enjoyable lunch for two (in their relatively-new lounge area) I've changed my tune on this restaurant. I think it's one of the best dining values in the Boston suburbs- if you play your cards right.

Celebrity chef Ming Tsai's (PBS's Simply Ming, Iron Chef) Blue Ginger is perhaps one of the top things Wellesley is known for nationally (2nd to Wellesley College/Hillary Clinton's time there). It's a gem of a restaurant, originally opened in 1998 and expanded in May 2008 to include private banquets and a lounge area where they're open for lunch and serving Asian small plates.

We arrived shortly before they opened at noon on Saturday and enjoyed our very-comfortable table in the lounge area adjacent to the redesigned bar. The seating was thoughtfully designed for this sort of dining- it's not as if you're awkwardly trying to eat food in a bar area.

We started with the Sweet Potato-Taro Fries with Chili Aioli ($4). Very nice- hot and crispy on the outside, soft on the inside with plenty of delicious dipping sauce. Tip: This is a great pick for folks looking to satisfy Wellesley's bizarre unique "you can't have a drink without ordering food" law.

Next, we chose a trio of Ming's Bings ($14)- an Asian dumpling-like interpretation of a slider. Fantastic. You can mix and match a variety of fillings- we chose the Blue "Cheeseburger" with Bacon, the Red Roast Duck, and the Traditional Ginger Pork Scallion. These were the highlight of the meal effectively giving us a chance to taste 3 unique flavors in a single dish. The Asian Slaw that accompanied this was particularly good.

Finally, the Blue Ginger Lettuce Cups ($13) were a nice rendition of a dish seen at many restaurants. I particularly enjoyed the slightly crunch texture imparted by the vegetables that accompanied the flavorful stir-fried soy chicken.

Here is a link to their complete LOUNGE MENU

We had a chance to talk with Deborah Blish about their wine program. She explained their wine selections are a group effort, with Chef Tsai making some of the selections personally.

Their new banquet rooms are configurable to handle groups of 10-80 and will host the following wine dinners:

• January 12 - East Meets Spain's Jorge Ordonez
  
• February 8 - Sake Dinner
  
• March 8 - Australian Wine Dinner
  
• April 5 - Honig Wine Dinner

More information on their EVENTS PAGE

Recommendation:

I think the lounge at Blue Ginger represents one of the most unique lunch-time dining venues in the western Boston suburbs. The range of flavors you can sample with a few small dishes is amazing and I highly recommend stopping in. This is top-notch food on a budget.

Check 'em out:
Blue Ginger
583 Washington St.
Wellesley, MA 02482
Follow @blue_ginger on Twitter

Question of the Day:
Have you been to Blue Ginger -or- recognize Ming Tsai's name from his TV shows? What do you think?

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Wine Shop Review: The Wine Bottega Boston

Sometimes the better stories take a little longer to write.

A few months ago, I had a day off from work so I decided to visit a wine shop that I've heard good things about but haven't been to in a couple years. The store: The Wine Bottega in Boston's North End.

The Wine Bottega was recently award Boston Magazine's highly regarded Best of Boston award in the Wine Shop category for 2009 beating out some formidable competition. In many ways, the Massachusetts wine market is a bit of an island unto itself with arcane legislation that prohibits open market competition on a number of levels. On the other hand, we're fortunate to have shops like The Wine Bottega that offer a high level of service and education to area wine enthusiasts.

The day I stopped in, owner Kerri Platt happened to be in and invited me to sit in and taste along through 24 wines that wholesaler Jeff Slavin from Hangtime Wine Company was pouring for their consideration. What an opportunity to try outstanding wines from all over Italy.

Kerri (formerly of Lower Falls Wine Co. in Newton, MA and Bare Cove Wine Annex in Hingham, MA) along with Matthew Mollo and Michael Dupuy made me feel right at home as we tasted through some good/very good Friuli, Super Tuscans and Nebbiolo d'Albas. They've got a way of being informative and educational without being preachy which I really appreciated. But when we got to the wines from Barbaresco I was *really* impressed. These wines had unique aromas I'd not experienced in others previously: Rose petals, tar and dark red fruit. Somehow these wines were, to me, dramatically different from Barolos I'd tasted (even though the two regions are within just a few miles of each other and both made from the Nebbiolo grape). The Barbareschi were medium bodied but very full of flavor. I was stunned by two wines in particular from Cigliuti- their 2004 Vigne Erte Barbaresco and to an even greater extent their 2004 Serraboella Barbaresco.

The shop doesn't focus exclusively on Italian wine, nor do they ignore every-day drinking wines. All of their selections are thoughtful and hand-picked. It's the kind of place where you can ask them to select 6 wines to help you explore a region you're interested in and they'll pick an assortment of varietally correct examples that give you a good sense of what to expect from that category. They offer free tastings every Friday night from 5-8PM and have a regular schedule of focused tasting events.

The Wine Bottega is located on Hanover Street in the heart of Boston's North End- home to unique Italian restaurants like Giaccomo's, Lucca and others. Not far from Bill Clinton's favorite spot (or so I've heard) for cannolis: Mike's Pastry. Parking is some of the tightest in the Boston area, but they validate and offer curbside pick-up!


Check 'em out:
The Wine Bottega
341 Hanover St.
Boston, MA 02113
(617)227-6607
http://thewinebottega.com
Follow them on Twitter
Find them on Facebook

Question of the Day:
Have you been to The Wine Bottega? If so, what did you think?

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San Diego Wine Co. Does it Again

For the past couple years I've been working with a customer out in San Diego. Prior to my first trip out there, I recalled a vacation we took in the area a few years back and the great wine prices on wine we found at a Costco in Carlsbad, so I thought to check an area Costco while I was out there. I got lost along the way and instead discovered San Diego Wine Co. That random act guided me to one of my favorite wine shops in the country.

Innocently situated in a strip mall near the Mirimar Naval Air Station, San Diego Wine Co keeps things simple. No fancy racks, or any racks at all for that matter: Wines are displayed mostly in the cardboard boxes they came in. They focus on popular categories like Napa Cabernet, domestic Pinot Noir, France and Italy. The wines they select in those categories tend to be highly rated by publications like Wine Spectator and hard to find -or- delicious crowd pleasers -or- small production California wineries I've never heard of before. The common denominator in the wines they select is that they offer them at unbeatable prices.

The past couple of times I've been out there, coincidentally, they've sent out their monthly newsletter announcing their latest best deals. Their deals always seem to include one or two wines that I've had a very hard time finding in Massachusetts. Here's what I got this time:

• 2007 Joseph Swan Pinot Noir Russian River Valley Cuvée de Trois
  93 WS/$28 Release Price/$26.95 at San Diego Wine Co.
  Fantastic wine- thoroughly enjoyed it.
  
• 2007 Coho Headwaters
  95WS on the '06/$40 Release Price/$31.95 at San Diego Wine Co.
  Sorry to say this one was consumed with the boys after hitting several bars. I seem to recall trumpeting the accolades of the '06 to my friends, probably talking about QPR more than they cared to hear about, and then heading out to get some burritos. :)
  
  Update: I did a more comprehensive tasting of the '06 and '07 Coho Headwaters.  Click here to have a look.
  
  
• 2006 Gaja Promis Toscana
  Best Price in MA: $39/$29.95 at San Diego Wine Co.
  Corked. Bummer. I didn't have time to take it back (though I'm always in favor of returning corked wine). Really saddened by this after enjoying the Gaja Sito Moresco so so much.
  

What to do next:

• Sign up for the San Diego Wine Co. newsletter
• If you're in Massachusetts, visit Wine ConneXtion in North Andover. Why? Because their business model is the closest I've seen in the state.

Question of the Day: Why are wine prices so much higher in Massachusetts than California for wines from freaking Italy!?

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And You Wonder Why I Try to Avoid Shipping Wine to Neighboring States

I've mentioned in the past that restrictive Massachusetts wine shipment laws are annoying to me because they require us to have wine shipped to neighboring states to take advantage of deals from out of state retailers. Invariably, something goes awry with this transaction: Missed shipment, couldn't connect with the driver to sign, 2 delivery attempts have been made, what's the tracking number again, where do I need to go to pick up this stuff? You get the idea. Even if things go smoothly you're imposing on a friend or relative to accept delivery.

It's not that big a deal, but I thought I'd share an E-mail exchange with my father-in-law that describes one of the better ways in which one of these transactions typically goes:

From: Me
To: My Father-in-law

Hi There,
I hope you don't mind, but I ordered some wine online and had it shipped to your place. It should arrive some time the first part of this week- 3 bottles. Here's the tracking info.
I think it will require a signature but I hope the FedEx guy can catch you on a day you're around and this isn't a nuisance for you.
Thanks! Appreciate it.
Love,
Bob

From: My Father-in-law
To: Me

Dear Bob,

Perfect timing.

I'm picking up a new bottle opener today.

Love,

Dad

From: My Father-in-law
To: Me

Dear Bob,

The hooch arrived yesterday.

They were all great!

Too bad we couldn't finish the third bottle, we were drunk and it spilled as I recall.

I guess we should have taken notes.

Love, Dad.

From: Me
To: My Father-in-law

I should have mentioned before- they weren't actually wine. They were poison, which I ordered to test whether someone might intercept the delivery and consume it for their own pleasure. Hope you're feeling okay. ;)
Love,
Bob

Ah, fatherly hazing. Good times.

On a serious note, I see that the dreaded Martha Coakley won the Democratic nomination for Ted Kennedy's US Senate seat. At first I thought this was an awful outcome given her opposition to consumer-friendly changes to Massachusetts wine shipping laws. However, as I think about this just a little more, I see this as an opportunity to get her out of the state Attorney General position so hey maybe things will free up a bit.

Summing this up: Every Massachusetts resident should be in favor of freeing up wine shipping laws because allowing legal shipments of wine would enable the state to derive tax revenue from the shipments thus reducing the need to raise taxes in the state further.

Like reading about stuff like this? I'd love it if you subscribed to updates via E-mail so we can continue the conversation.

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