I'm meeting some friends for dinner tonight and will be bringing wine. Here is the menu and my thoughts for pairing. Any comments?

First course (by me):
Shrimp and lobster salad in bread bowl with capers, red onions and homemade aioli.
Lobster bisque.
Wine: 2000 Beringer Sbragia Chardonnay

Second course (others):
Grilled New York Steaks with baked potatoes.
Wine: 2000 Kistler Sonoma Coast Pinot and/or 1997 Fife Cabernet Sauvignon

Dessert course: Some kind of cake (unknown):
Buller fine tokay.

Pretty simple fair with straight forward wines. I'm bringing a backup bottle of 2000 Martinelli Jackass in case one of the other reds is, god forbid, corked.

Sounds good to me (food/wine-pairings).

1 question: Why do you live so far away?

GA -

Sounds excellent to me. If you do end up opening the Kistler SC PN, give it at least 3 hours in the decanter. It needs it.

That should be a great dinner. We're participating in Lilac's DPAW tonight and are having friends over. The theme is to be French, so we're having the following:

Baked Brie, St Andre, and Basque cheeses with 1997 Chablis Grand Cru "Les Clos" (Jean Moreau)

Coq au Vin, Shitake and Portobello risotto (not exactly French, so sue me), and asparagus with 1 1975 Chateau Montrose and probably another bottle of aged Bordeaux to be selected from the five or six I have standing up.

Just some fruit for dessert with no wine.

Hey Board-O: It looks like you found a place to put that demi!

GA - also a good menu. Your seafood might also match well with a French Mersault or Puligny.

Board-O - what's your address again? Great menus.

Actually, I'm not using the demiglace because I'm trying to minimize carbs for a few days. Yeah, I know about the wine. I'm not using the demiglace because I'm not going to eat any of the risotto and won't taste it.

Our extra wine will be a 1989 Chateau Talbot.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmfooooooooooooood

I love food.

I wish I didn't have a stoopid cold, right now, everything tastes pretty much the same. In fact everything sounds pretty much the same since my ears have not opened for over two days.

ARGH!

Feel better, TJ. Dinner last night was pretty bad. I overcooked the coq au vin and all three wines were disappointing.

Actually we ate out at a newer restaurant in DC before an EXPLOSIVE Washington Capitals game.

Greek/Lebanese "tapas" I know there is a different word for it, but that is what it is. Had an unexpectedly good Greek wine...

1999 Paranga Florina, which is made of a blend of of native xinomavro and merlot

Sorry Board_O. It happens to the best of us.

and me too.