How do YOU like to celebrate your best friends birthday?

I, for one, like to invite myself over to her apartment so that she can cook me a lovely dinner and serve me amazing wine while lounging on her beautiful new guest couch, naturally!  Geeze, when I put it that way I sound like a kind of horrible friend…  But the meal was wonderful without my help and I am very excited to tell you about it!  So, on the actual day of my friends birthday she and her hubs traveled to the Sakonnet Winery in Little Compton, RI.  They had a wonderful time sampling wine and stayed at an adorable little guest house nearby.  I am so proud of my girl, she totally went outside her comfort zone and tried some Chardonnay’s during her tasting!  She has always had a strong aversion to the “oakiness” of Chardonnay despite my insistence that not ALL Chards are that “oaky,” but at the request of the wine manager at the vineyard she tried their award-winning “No-oak” Chard.  (It’s funny how if feel that I can use made-up words and justify their non-existence by simply putting them in quotes, interesting habit…)  She was skeptical, but in the end she loved it!  She loved it so much that she bought some extra bottles and served it with the tremendous pasta bake she prepared for us.  Roasted veggies, whole wheat penne, smoked mozzarella, fontina, yuuuuum…  It’s a Giada recipe, you should totally check it out…  Anyway, the pairing was perfect!  The crisp, non-oakiness of the Chard paired really well with the smoky flavors of the cheese and roasted veggies.  And the lightness of the wine was great with the whole wheat pasta, it kind of cleansed the palate with each sip and eliminated that sticky sensation you can sometimes get from wheat pastas or breads.  All in all, I give my lady an A++.  I sincerely hope you invite us over again soon, perhaps after the wedding so I can really indulge…  :)  So try the recipe and check out Sakonnet Winery!  In a town with a name like “Little Compton,” how could you really go wrong?

(photos via here and here)