August 2022: Issue 20
Harvest Festival A Love Parade A Moveable Feast Provencal Vegetables
by Joey Wolosz | Published August 25, 2022
A Note from Joey Wolosz
As August comes to an end, harvest season begins. Our Napa Valley Chardonnay came in this morning and the fruit looks beautiful. The Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir will soon follow. Let the harvest begin, huzzah!
Julia Child’s birthday was this month, August 15th. I thought it’d be the ideal month to chat with Katie Pratt. Katie is the co-author of France is a Feast, A Photographic Journey of Paul and Julia Child, an art curator who arranged the exhibit under the same name at the Napa Valley Museum, and a close family friend of the Childs. She is a tastemaker that I think you should know.
The Child’s Provençal retreat, La Pitchoune, in the village of Plascassier, is the inspiration for this month’s recipe. Farmers’ Markets are abundant now with summer produce and provide all that is necessary to transport you and the guests at your table to the South of France with a quality ratatouille.
Springing back to our own Mediterranean Napa sunshine reminds me to remind you to save the date! This coming October 1 is Yountville Days. I hope to see you there.
Joe
Vintner, Cook, Yountvillian
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he first Saturday of October is the hallowed Yountville Days. I’m not sure why it is plural because it is really only one day and one day you do not want to miss. Like the Oscars, this is the moment where Yountville celebrates its own. Once again, Gentleman Farmer will represent with a proper float in our small town parade. Wine club members are welcome to join us on the float and in the parade; in fact they are encouraged.
Our band, Phat Ankle, will be performing as we drift down Washington Street. Jeff recently joined the band with his clarinet and this will be his debut performance. There will be an after party to keep the celebration going.
If you are not a member of the Gentleman Farmer Wine Club Collective and would like to float down the quaint main street of the Hamlet of Yount, click here.
Jeff and I met Katie Pratt at the outdoor bar at R+D Kitchen in Yountville a few years ago. I am unsure how it came up, but we started talking about Julia Child. Katie is a Napa local, a photographer, art curator, author, winemaker, artist, and a lifelong friend of Paul and Julia Child. Katie and her parents were among Paul and Julia’s closest friends. How cool is that?
That afternoon I shared that Julia came to Cal Poly Pomona when Jeff and I were students in the Hotel Restaurant Management program. It was an event for the American Institute of Wine and Food, an organization she helped organize. I can’t remember the particulars, but the students got to cook right alongside her.
Jeff shared that he had waited on her twice, once when he worked at Left Bank in Larkspur and once at Jardinière in San Francisco.
Katie was the first person I reached out to when I was interviewing for The Julia Child Challenge on the Food Network (I didn’t make the cut). I think these small Julia connections were just enough to keep our communication going with Katie over the years, and I’ve been lucky to get to know her.
Katie was a student of Paul Child. Paul was a gifted photographer; however, his artistic work had remained largely out of the public eye. After Paul’s death and with Julia’s permission, Katie set out to change that. She teamed up with the Child’s great-nephew and author, Alex Prud’homme, to write and create the book France is a Feast, The Photographic Journey of Paul and Julia Child with over 200 of Paul’s photographs, documenting their years in France.
Katie also curated the exhibit of the same name at the Napa Valley Museum with the Child’s personal objects, intimate photographs, and an audio tour with the voice of Julia featuring interviews with chefs Jacques Pépin, Thomas Keller, and Cindy Pawlcyn.
Bring an appetite; this interview is a feast.
Ratatouille is the sunset of summer dishes made with a kaleidoscope of end of season vegetables, held together with a fair amount of that bottled sunshine, olive oil. Eggplants, zucchini, onions, and red peppers are abundant during this time and early fall. I have been in the throes of ratatouille making for the past couple of weeks, testing different approaches and sipping a fair amount of rosé while doing so.
It is just as delicious served warm, room temperature, or even cold. It can elevate your buffet game and is great to bring for a summer potluck. It can be a vegetarian main, a side dish, or a spread for crackers. The point is, the dish is so versatile it can cover a lot of ground, is super tasty, and worth adding to your kitchen repertoire.
Ratatouille takes a little time if you want to build the flavors, but the rewards are big. Taking a cue from Rebekah Peppler’s book, À Table, my recipe uses a bit of that other summer sunshine, our Napa Valley Rosé. This ratatouille pairs well with our 2021 Gentleman Farmer Napa Valley Rosé; however, this also works well with a white or red wine. Ratatouille doesn’t judge, but I’m drinking rosé, so I’ll lean into that.
