Poached eggs with shiitake mushrooms, wilted arugula and white truffle cream

Mushrooms. This is what comes to mind when I think about my beloved friend Sky Pape.

Mushrooms. That’s what Sky orders whenever we manage to steal a little time away from our hectic lives to have dinner together. Whether it be roasted portobello mushrooms tossed in a salad, porcini mingling with fresh pasta, or flatbreads adorned with wild mushrooms and aged cheeses, if mushrooms are on the menu, I know that’s what she’s ordering.

Sky is an extraordinary artist. For her latest drawings, Water Works: Surface Tension, she worked on the floor and blew ink through tubes and funnels onto handmade papers from Japan, Korea and Nepal. Sky “breathes life” into each drawing to create “forms and lines that divulge our connectedness with nature, a reminder of our shared fragility.”

Today, her new drawings are being unveiled at the June Kelly Gallery in New York City. They will be on exhibit there until March 9. Then Sky packs up her bags and boards a plane to begin a month-long residency at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center in Italy.

To congratulate her for her abundant achievements still so near to the dawn of 2010, I could present Sky with a huge bouquet of roses. But I’d much rather create a dish for her.

Mushrooms. Let’s start with plump shiitake mushrooms, pan-roasted in a pat of butter. Let’s serve them with wilted arugula and crispy slices of sourdough bread. Let’s crown them with farm-fresh poached eggs. And, as a last touch, let’s drizzle the whole thing with a white truffle cream made with Gourmet Attitude’s deep and intensely flavorful Tartufata.

It’s a tall order, but I hope I was able to “blow life” into this recipe! One thing’s for sure, though: I certainly blew love into it! The mere thought of this dish makes me smile and celebrate the beauty of Sky’s spirit, the exquisiteness of her work and her penchant for those irresistible fungi: mushrooms!

Bonny Doon Vineyard – Ca’ Del Solo Dolcetto 2007 ($22)

Last week, I received my D.E.W.N. box, the precious package that Bonny Doon Vineyard ships to its club members several times a year. As I read the winemaker’s (aka the relentlessly creative Randall Grahm’s) note for the two new wines I received, it immediately occurred to me that the 2007 Ca’ Del Solo Dolcetto would be the perfect match for today’s recipe. That night, I decanted a bottle as recommended and served it with the poached eggs.

The wine was all that I wanted it to be! Ruby red, delicately complex, with juicy fruit notes and earthy tones, the 2007 Dolcetto was light enough not to overpower the dish and yet picked up on the flavor of the mushrooms and truffles. A perfect and harmonious marriage, and a wine we continued to sip long after our plates had been licked clean!

This dish is an obvious choice for brunch, but I also love to serve it for a light dinner with baby potatoes pan-roasted in a little brown butter and olive oil, and a crisp mesclun salad. The only problem is, we always want seconds!

Disclosure: I received unsolicited free samples from Gourmet Attitude — but would not have featured them here if I didn’t think their products were outstanding.

Disclaimer: As always, my point of view is my own. I do not accept samples, and have no commercial relationship with any product, food or wine company.

Tagged as: Arugula, Bonny Doon Vineyard, Brunch, Dolcetto, Eat, Eggs, Eggs benedict, poached eggs, R1, Shiitake mushrooms, Tartufata, Truffle cream, winter