UNIQUELY DELICIOUS
Expand your cocktail horizons with refreshing drinks that use unexpected mixers, with exceptional results.
Warming up some store-bought vegetable samosas in the oven is the only last-minute item on this easy menu. Hard-boil your eggs in advance (quail eggs for cuteness) and cut up a warm baguette to serve with your favourite hummus. Decant a jar of green goddess dressing into a bowl. How long you spend building your Veggie Tower is entirely your call. Use any grilled or raw vegetables you like (the more the merrier) but make sure each one is appropriately seasoned before you pile them up on your presentation “tower.” Consider grilled zucchini, eggplant slices and carrots, blanched green beans, raw cauliflower or broccoli florets, radishes, fennel, pattypan squashes, endive leaves and cucumber spears. The bowls of hummus and dressing can be nestled amongst them.
Bubbles are always welcome at brunchtime. Rosehall Run’s Pixie Sparkling Rosé VQA (LCBO 492959, $19.95) is an off-dry sparkling Vidal tinted pink by Pinot Noir, frothy but rich and full of red berry, peach and citrus flavours. Henry of Pelham Rosé VQA (LCBO 613471, $14.95) loads a big juicy wine with bushels of red berries and cherries while Creekside Sauvignon Blanc VQA (LCBO 620724, $15.95) is lighter and brighter with a grassy grapefruit acidity—very refreshing! Or consider a great Ontario craft cider like Ardiel Dry Apple Cider
(LCBO 497214, 473 mL, $3.45) with its pure fresh-apple flavour, or the
Hopped Cider (LCBO 552653, 473 mL, $3.20) from the new Malus Cider House in Niagara-on-the-Lake—lighttextured, off-dry, with an intriguing hint of hoppy bitterness in the finish.