Trader Joe's Manitaropita

Dear People of Greece: Thank you so much for continuing to create delicious dishes that consist of phyllo dough filled with amazingly good stuff.

I was kind of surprised when I realized that I hadn't reviewed these yet. I have loved the Trader Joe's manitaropita for years, and they are one of my TJ's staples, but somehow they flew under the review radar until now. And we all know how much I like appetizers or finger foods as dinner, so I figured it was high time I wrote about this.



The easiest way to explain what manitaropita is might be to tell you to think of spanakopita...except rather than the puff pastry being filled with spinach and feta cheese, it's filled with mushrooms in a white wine sauce.

Trader Joe's manitaropita needs to be baked in the oven. The package specifically says not to microwave them -- and having done that out of laziness once, I can tell you that the package's admonition is a wise one.



No worries, though, because baking them is as simple as it sounds. Just pre-heat the oven and then toss them in. They only take about 10 minutes to bake. The phyllo dough (and really, does it take much more then phyllo dough to make something good?) rises to golden, flaky happiness. The many paper-thin layers add a nice crunch and interesting texture.



Trader Joe is generous with the mushroom filling -- which is a good thing, as the filling is excellent. The mushrooms are remarkably non-rubbery and have a rich, almost beefy taste.

The mushrooms are done in a white wine sauce. The sauce itself actually has a delicate, lightly herbed taste. If I had to pick out a single spice that stands out, I would have to say it's oregano. Just think of it! Mushrooms, white wine, oregano...all stewed together and encased in flaky phyllo...if the very notion doesn't bring a smile to your face, don't complain to me: complain to a doctor!

This is truly one of my favorite Trader Joe's products. It's satisfying as a meal on its own, and I would also be very pleased to serve them to company as an appetizer.



PURCHASED FROM:
Trader Joe's

PRICE:
$3.99

CALORIES:
80 calories per piece.

ADDITIONAL INFO:
Made on equipment shared with eggs and tree nuts, at a facility that processes peanuts, fish and shellfish.

OFFICIAL WEBSITE:
traderjoes.com

Manischewitz Concord Grape Wine

This may be the post that finally causes my mother to board a plane from Atlanta to Los Angeles, for the sole purpose of coming to my house so she can slap me upside the head...

Wine is an important part of many meals, and the Seder dinner is no exception. The beginning of the meal starts with the kiddush, and during that a blessing is said over wine. The wine itself must, of course, be not only kosher but -- you guessed it -- kosher for Passover.

There are many, many kosher wines out there, and from what I have heard, some of them (I cannot say which, as I have not actually had them) are quite good. I went with Manischewitz because it is the brand that is most commonly found in American supermarkets, and also it's the subject of many a bad joke (which appeals to my warped sense of humor). It is also the wine that was used at my family's Passover dinners...and here's where my mother pulls out the whacking stick...



I should mention that my mother is not Jewish. Her roots are Italian and Albanian, and her religious affiliation -- on paper, at least -- is Roman Catholic. But she married into a Jewish family, and for her first big Passover Seder she decided to go with a combo of yummy homemade items, which naturally included our favorite honey-baked ham!

No, I am not making that up just for shock value. Yes, she really fed pork to Jews, and on Passover, no less. And no, she didn't do it out of some sick sort of latent anti-Semitism, either. She honestly figured that since she loves honey-baked ham so much, why wouldn't everyone else?

To be fair, though -- and thank G-d! -- that side of the family is very secular. They're pretty much the Jewish equivalent of the "holiday Catholics" that our side is, really only doing the bare minimum of observation, and even that just for the Jewish holidays. None of them keep kosher, and rest assured no one was offended. (Although my mother's embarrassment was...well, I can only leave you to imagine.)

The family's then-rabbi was invited to the next Seder the following night. (I don't know why exactly, but my mother did Seders two nights in a row.) For obvious reasons the ham was kept off this dinner's menu, but the Manischewitz wine was in attendance -- as was my then six-year-old stepbrother, who was raised Jewish.

Unnoticed by the adults, said stepbrother had grabbed of one of the many bottles of Manischewitz on the table. You see, he really loved grape juice. And he had been drinking a lot of the also-plentiful Kedem brand kosher grape juice...which looks just like wine when poured into a glass...and of course the Manischewitz has those gorgeous Concord grapes on the label...well, you can see where this is going, can't you?

It became clear when he passed out in front of the rabbi that he had been drinking something other than the Kedem. Yeah, I know it probably should have been more obvious, but when you have a pack of rowdy, loud, giggling six-year-olds running wild in the house, it can be hard to notice when one of them is a little more "off" than the others -- especially if that one tended to be the ringleader anyway. It has been something we have brought up ever since. And no, my mother has never again served ham at a Seder -- I think more out of hoping to hear the eventual end of it, rather than adding a second helping, so to speak.

Anyway, now that I am clearly out of the will...

I got my own bottle of Manischewitz. They make Concord grape, white grape, cherry, and black currant versions. We always had the Concord grape, so that is what I am using. (Though Googling has shown me that the Black Currant may actually be more popular.)

I also went with it chilled. Yes, it is a red wine, but that's the only way I have ever had it. I don't know if that is how it is best served, or if it is simply a preference that I have gotten used to.



It looks more like grape juice than actual wine to me. I am by no means a wine expert, but it seems thinner in body and more frothy than, let's say, a glass of Pinot Noir (my red of choice).

It smells vaguely wine-like. I say "vaguely," because it smells too sweet; more like store brand made-from-concentrate grape juice, or maybe a very cheap wine that Kool Aid mix was added to.

So how does it taste?

It tastes like purple! And what I mean by that is that it's like every other purple grape juice on the planet. Then add Dimetapp to it and toss in a healthy cup or two of sugar. If you have ever tasted Drank, you've got the idea. As a wine, it's perfectly dreadful. But as just some sort of a sweet grape drink (albeit with alcohol), that's another story. In fact, if you take the concept of the drink actually being wine out of the equation, it's really not horrible at all. It's one of those things that are so bad they're kind of good.

Again, I will be the first to admit that there are far more sophisticated kosher wines out there. But it would almost be a disservice to ignore this old and popular holiday staple.



PURCHASED FROM:
Gelson's Market

PRICE:
$4.50

OFFICIAL WEBSITE:
manischewitzwine.com (Cookies must be enabled.)

Sweet's Candy: Cabernet Dark Chocolate Wine Gels

I love gel/jelly candy. There is something about the texture that always seems to rock my world...sort of like an edible Hugh Jackman, rising glistening from pristine blue water. (Sorry, Gigi just really likes the image.) I also really like Cabernet, but for various uninteresting health reasons I don't get to drink as much of it as I might like to. The idea of getting the flavor of the wine without the aftereffects really appealed to me.

These candies are long sticks of Cabernet wine flavored gels, enrobed in dark chocolate. The domed box opens from its side, and reveals the sticks ensconced on a protective bed inside a decorative plastic bag.



Each stick is thin and about 2.5 inches long. The sticks are a dark, rich brown and smell sort of like weak wine and chocolate. The candy is in fact made with wine. However, there is no actual alcohol in the sticks.

When you bit into the candy, it is very soft and a little sticky. It's incredibly smooth. The chocolate layer is thin and quickly flakes away when bitten into.



Honestly, I am glad the chocolate is so thin -- because while it's not bad, it's also not great. It's waxy and kind of grainy. It seems too sweet for a dark chocolate. It actually reminded me more of the type of chocolate coating you'd find on ice cream bars rather than a good dark chocolate. (There also a milk chocolate version as well. I had planned on picking that one up too, but by the time I got this box the milk chocolate boxes were gone.)



Really, this candy is all about the gel center. The gel is a shade of stained glass red -- and set against the darkness of the chocolate, it does make for a pretty candy. And woohoo! The gel in fact does taste like Cabernet!

OK, you wine snobs out there probably won't be impressed. No, it's not the most high end cab out there, but it's not the worst either. And we shouldn't expect it to the finest. After all, it's just candy, not a cherished, dust covered vintage from a French wine cave. It's sweet, but there is no mistaking it was meant to taste like deep red wine.

In my never ending quest to be as thorough as possible I discovered that there is however, a very real, very interesting aftertaste. Once the chocolate flavor wanes and the wine flavors back down the jelly that's left (this is assuming you are simply letting the candy melt in your mouth rather then chewing) tastes remarkably like sugared beets! Granted this flavor come up long after most people would have just swallowed and been done with it, so it is not something you will probably notice just casually eating the sticks. I don't know if the taste is caused by the wearing off of the wine flavoring or if perhaps the candy is made with Beet sugar or maybe it's just a subtle tribute to Dwight Shrute. In any event if you wait long enough it's there.

So-so chocolate aside I really liked these gels. It's a nice to have a gel option that isn't merely fruit flavored. The texture was addicting and it made me think about Dwight Shrute so how good that be anything other then good?

Cybele recently reviewed the Dark Chocolate Port wine version. Be sure to read her review HERE


PURCHASED FROM:
Albertsons Supermarket

PRICE:
$2.99

CALORIES:
160 calories per 5 sticks

ADDITIONAL INFO:
Made on equipment shared with nuts. Kosher, gluten free, contains sulfites.

OFFICIAL WEBSITE:
sweetcandy.com

Ciao Bella Blackberry Cabernet Sorbet

I know that wine sorbets are not exactly new, but with the lone exception of the Cabernet sorbet from Bennett's Ice Cream at the Los Angeles Farmers Market, I have not had the chance to try any other versions.

Mind you, I've seen the pint containers of Ciao Bella Blackberry Cabernet Sorbet in supermarkets for at least a year, and I've kept coming up with reasons not to get it. But I figured, hey -- it's Christmas Eve, and if that isn't as good an excuse to indulge as any, there'll never be a better one. (Well, OK, maybe New Year. But I didn't feel like waiting another week.)



The sorbet is a deep purple. It really does look like frozen Cabernet. It also smells like Cabernet. Yes, I like it when things that are flavored with wine and/or liqueur actually look and taste like the real thing.



So, does it taste like the real thing? YES IT DOES!

The first thing you taste is an explosion of berries. It's very sweet -- kinda like raspberries, cherries, and blueberries had an orgy, followed by the birth of a really purple baby. (I'll otherwise not speculate on what a creature with three biological parents might be like. Suffice to say I live in Southern California, which is entirely weird enough already.)

Just when you start thinking the berries are a little too sweet, the tart, slightly puckering grape emerges.

You know the way good red wine tastes after you've held it in your mouth for a few seconds so that it's warmed slightly from your own body heat, and then you swallow it? That's exactly the flavor that kicks in. If you don't know what that is like, I'm not sure I can do it justice but here goes... It's like slightly sour grapes, there's a little cherry and some currants. It's sort of like a frozen wine cooler -- but I mean that in the best way possible.

Y'know what? Just get some of this!



PURCHASED FROM:
Vons Supermarket

First Blush Chardonnay Juice

Juice made with wine grapes!

Genius.
Way, way, back about a million years ago when Gigi was but a wee loud, obnoxious kid (shocking that she grew up to be a loud, obnoxious adult isn't it?!) we had a family friend that made his own wine. And he often had grapes around that he would let us kids snack on. I couldn't begin to even guess what kind of wine grapes they were- about all I remember is that they were both red and white, as he made red and white wines. But, I can tell you that I loved to eat the grapes.
They were sweet and yet a little bigger. They had seeds in them (which I did not like) and the red grapes tended to stain. I remember that during the summer they would freeze some and use them as ice for the wine (what is it with Italians and red wine with ice?!- I swear at least half my family does it)

First Blush Juices are made with wine grapes, yet they are free of alcohol, added sugars and preservatives and they are caffeine free (but I won't hold that against them) and they are also high in antioxidants. All this reminiscing and blurbing is great but how does it taste?

I started with the Chardonnay because it has been hotter then hell here this past week (it's been in the 90's!) and I wanted something light and crisp.

Smelling the juice it smells more like classic white grape juice then chardonnay.
The first taste... It lacks the sweetness of white grape juice. I can tell that there are some apple and peach notes. But that doesn't change the fact that the main thing it reminded me of was honey cough drops and morning breath. Oddly enough not the best combo ever. A saving grace maybe that I did notice as the juice came to room temp it tasted less nasty and more like regular grape juice.

I loved the idea of this juice and I am going to try the reds- the chardonnay just did nothing for me.

Ritter Sport- Rotwein Truffle

Who could resist a red wine truffle?

I couldn't which is why I snapped this up on a recent visit to my local German deli.
This deli has a truly impressive assortment of Ritter Sport bars imported directly from Germany. I had no idea that they had so many flavors!

The red wine truffle bar immediately caught my eye because it seemed so different to the rest of the line.

When you open the package if you take a good whiff you can tell right away that this is flavored with red wine. It's sort of reminded me of the smell of cheap table wine meets Raisinettes- which is actually more pleasant then it sounds.

The truffles are made with a creamy milk chocolate that is on the sweeter side. In different circumstances it would be a little too sweet for me. But with bitterness of the wine it works really well. The truffle filling is a soft creme- based on the smell I had been worried that there would be a more liquid center. The initial flavor of the center again reminded me mostly of raisin. The after taste however is all red wine.

I am not going to tell you that you would be able to pin down the type of red wine it is supposed to be, it reminded me most of the cheap jugs of Carlo Rossi table wines my Grandmother kept on hand (truth be told the Paisano is a perfectly serviceable cheap table wine) but there is no doubt that it is a red wine filling.

I liked it enough that I would buy it again!

PURCHASED FROM:
Upland German Deli