Becca Richards, Stoller Vineyard's culinary director and executive chef, prides herself on simple ingredients and excellent wine pairings. But, in the boy’s club of New York City restaurants, where she began her career, her choices were often frowned upon.
“It was almost shocking to me how well received my style was here, because in New York, it was downplayed,” Richards said. “I had to butch my stuff up instead.”
Here is some of her advice on how to have a wine-focused meal that creates big wows with easy, seasonal ingredients.
Work with Wine in Unexpected Ways
Keep it Simple
“It’s been crazy the compliments that I’ve gotten from guests,” Richards said. “The way that my food interacts with Melissa’s wines is a dream pairing, because it’s bold enough to be modern, but it’s got a feminine flair that runs through it.”
One of Richards’ favorite techniques is to compress fruit in the wine, which makes the fruit burst with its own natural flavors and the bouquet of wine. In one of her favorite dishes recently, Richards roasted peaches, then cold cooked them in riesling and compressed them.
If you don’t have a compressor or vacuum sealer at home, you can make cold cooked fruit by soaking the fruit in your chosen wine, then draining the liquids and placing it in a ziplock bag. Press out as much air as you can, then freeze overnight. Take the fruit out and thaw, and be amazed by the change in texture! Get the step-by-step here.
For her compressed, roasted peaches, Richards mixed them with watermelon, basil and feta to create a unique take on a fruit salad!
When in Doubt, Go for Pinot.
“Pinot noir goes with any meal, because of its acidity,” Burr said. “The tannin levels aren’t so exuberant, so it doesn’t need a steak dinner to hold that taste.”
For women who aspire to take their culinary creations out of the kitchen and into the professional culinary world, Richards encourages you to fight hard for the decisions you know.
“Don’t lose hope. If you come up against the barrier, push back,” Richards said. “If you let your guard down, you don’t push back, they’re going to let you stay there and they’ll happily let you stay there. You’ve gotta take a stand.”