Cooking Class via Zoom with Imagery Wine and Truffle Shuffle
This is an at home cooking adventure. We have belonged to Imagery Wine Club for over 20 years. First, they are the nicest people and, of course, have terrific wines. Sadly, we have not visited in over two years, but their wine still makes it way to our front porch.
Recently Imagery offered a cooking class and paired wine tasting for members. It would be all held over Zoom. We thought it would be a fun way to spend a Saturday night. We invited our good friends over, who are also wine club members, and we were ready to cook, drink and learn.
The recipe was Chicken Cacciatore, from a company called Truffle Shuffle. We had never heard of them before but we are glad we know them now!
Everything needed, right down to the herbs and onions came in one box from Truffle Shuffle. The box was on ice, arriving nice and cold. The instructions gave what to place in the refrigerator and what could sit out.
The wine came in a separate box from Imagery. Since the theme was Italian we received a 2018 Tusca Brava (found HERE) and a 2018 Sangiovese (found HERE).
When our friends arrived we got right to chopping. (Notice, the hands of our friend this time!)
Button Mushrooms
These were the smallest mushrooms I’d ever seen. They needed a good wash and then we quartered them.
You can see by the hands below, everyone got to do some chopping!
Boneless, Skinless Chicken Thighs.
They had done all the work for us! And the salt was not just any salt, it was Balinese Truffle Salt (yum!) and a pepper unlike any we’d had before.
The crew!!! We started about 5PM and actually did some prepping before the zoom started at 6PM.
With all the prep done we were ready for the zoom to start.
The class has started! Notice the high tech iPad stand. Sadly we did not get many pictures of both the wine tasting or the cooking, because we were so involved.
We were so impressed that the winemaker herself, Jamie Benziger was on hand to take us through the wine tasting. She too was cooking with us, along with her sister Jill and their Uncle. I love that she grew up in the wine business but worked her way through the business before taking on winemaker. Read about Jamie: HERE
Truffle Shuffle co-founder Jason McKinney was our chef for the night. Check out their story: HERE
If you watch Shark Tank, you’ll know that Mark Cuban himself invested in this business. These guys are for real, with great roots as chefs in some of the best restaurants in the world.
Cooking away, while watching and listening to Chef Jason. He was just great. His background includes working as a Chef at The French Laundry.
Oh now it’s turning into something good. There is a big gap between the steps here, I know, but we were really enjoying listening to Jamie talk about the wine and Jason, navigate us through the cooking.
I would say the difference between this recipe and traditional Chicken Cacciatore was the spices. This recipe added dried red chili flakes, oregano and rosemary. Then we added fresh sprigs of thyme to simmer in the sauce.
Smelling so good!
After simmering for a bit, we added the chicken back to the pot and let it simmer some more.
On the side we cooked the pasta, which was a Penne. After draining it we tossed it with a bit of delicious truffle oil.
Then it was ready to pull together.
If you have read our blog you know we do make our version of Chicken Cacciatore. This blew our minds! It was soooo good.
Check out the very top…the truffle carpaccio. WOW, just wow! It’s available to buy HERE
Today we are not sharing this recipe, just the experience. I highly recommend Truffle Shuffle as a great at home experience.
It was a fun and unique way to spend a Saturday evening.
Thank you for reading this! I am grateful you are here. It’s been so much fun to share our cooking, traveling and connected to both, adventures with you.
Love, Jenn
