When it comes to ethnicity, food, and wine, I encourage vigorous interactions. They usually produce results that are unorthodox, exciting, and very successful. Such was the case with my lunch today. Our local farmers produce excellent vegetables, including greens of all sorts. Yesterday I bought a bunch of their greens, including Broccoli Rabe. It was bright green, very clean, and ready for whatever I wanted to do with it.

Classical treatment suggested 3-4 minutes blanching in well-salted water. Then the greens were chopped coarsely and sautéed in a very hot skillet with olive oil, garlic, and crushed hot peppers from Calabria.

Now comes the invention: we had a few of Barbara’s superb matzo balls leftover from the Seder on Saturday and lunch on Sunday. This afternoon she declared she was done for the season, but they are so good, I could not bring myself to throw them out. After sautéeing the Rabe, I decided to heat up some of the matzo balls and serve them with the greens. Wow!!! Delicious.

To complete the extraordinary blend of cultures, I had a glass of my new favorite Portuguese white wine, a 2020 Taboadella Encruzado from Portugalia. A home run in any language.