Restaurants featuring special wine dinners

Local foodies have some serious dining-out options this month, as three area restaurants are offering special, multi-course dinners with paired beverages at each course.

The Grape Tap

Originally slated for later in the month as a diner’s choice dinner, the popular Wasilla eatery had solicited suggestions on its Facebook for a theme for its March special dinner. Instead, with warmer, lighter days enticing Alaskans, March 19 has been chosen as the date for the affair, just in time for the equinox.

“We changed our mind,” owner Kristin Cook wrote in a recent Facebook post. “We’ve decided to embrace the springtime weather with a light, fun menu of five wines and five food pairings.”

Executive Chef Gretchen Hopping’s menu will feature a vegetable plate and lemon feta dip, paired with chenin blanc. That will be followed by prosciutto-wrapped asparagus in puff pastry and a glass of rose.

Next up is whipped feta with roasted strawberries, served with a glass of jammy gamay. That will precede the entrée, lamb gyro lettuce wraps served alongside grenache. Dessert is lemon poppyseed cake, paired with pinot noir.

Reservations are required for the 6 p.m. special dinner, which is $95 per person.

Feather and Flour

Not to be outdone, the little Palmer restaurant with big kitchen talent will be cheffing up big on-the-plate flavor with its own five-course dinner on March 19. Feather and Flour co-owners Heather Greenwood and Luke Hyce are touting the event as “the five-course meal we’ve been hoping to make happen for years.”

“To celebrate the balance of equinox, Double Shovel Cider Company will be joining us to create a meal of cozy and bright flavors with fantastic brews,” they posted on Facebook.

Leading off the March 19 dinner will be a raw Alaska oyster, served on the half shell with cranberry-apple-jalapeno mignonette, paired with cranberry cider. That will be followed by braised-beef pot pie, served with farmhouse hopped cider.

A spring strawberry salad with rhubarb vinaigrette will precede the entrée – champagne-poached halibut with cider beurre blanc. Those will be paired, respectively, with crimson mint cider and cider mosa.

Dessert will be caramel apple galette with house-churned ice cream. Spiced apple cider will accompany the dessert course.

Reservations are required for the dinner, which has two seating options – 5:30 and 7:30. This is a 21-and-over affair and costs $150 per person.

Chop House at Lake Lucille

Later this month, on March 26, diners are invited on a transcontinental culinary journey. Joshua Broda, Chop House’s executive chef and managing partner, has curated what he calls “an elegant symphony of taste and ambiance” at the lakeside establishment with spectacular views.

Diners will be treated to a six-course global tour that pairs each course with a different wine from some of the world’s great wine regions. The event will feature the wines of Vineyard Brands, an importer that represents more than 80 wineries.

Broda has chosen to lead off the dinner with a creole oyster, served warm in the half shell on sautéed spinach and topped with a crawfish creole hollandaise sauce. It will be paired with sparkling rosé from the Rhone region of France.

Next up is a sampling of international cheeses and accompaniments. Sauvignon blanc, from Marlborough, New Zealand, will be poured with the cheese course.

That will be followed by King Tartare, a dish of troll-caught Alaska king salmon adorned with fresh herbs and caviar. The first red wine of the evening, Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, will accompany the salmon.

A champagne intermezzo will precede the main course. Delamotte Brut, will be accompanied by a palate-cleanser of house-made fresh lemon Champagne sorbet.

Next stop will be Argentina, for the main course, smoked brisket, served with eloté corn polenta and chimichurri sauce. Malbec, a medium-bodied, fruity Argentine red, will be poured with the entree. The wine tour will end in Portugal, with a glass of Warre’s Otima 20-year-old Tawny port. It will be served with cherry clafoutis, a classic French pastry with sweet red cherries and creamy Romanoff sauce.

In addition to the great food and wine, Broda said the event offers the chance for diners to “meet the staff and experience the creativity of our talented kitchen.”

“It’s the perfect opportunity to savor delicious flavors, connect with the community, and enjoy the warm atmosphere we’re known for,” he said.

The dinner is for ages 21 and up and costs $150 per person. Reservations are required for the dinner, which begins at 6 p.m.