In remarks welcoming the media to a preview of the dinner, Jill Biden spoke about how her mom taught her about the best way eating can convey individuals collectively — and that even humble meals may very well be elevated by a wonderful setting. “Even if we were only having fish sticks from the freezer, she always made our dinners feel special,” she stated. Not that frozen entrees will discover their approach to the linen draped tables on Thursday. The fastidiously deliberate dinner is “an expression of welcome and friendship — a way to connect through a language that transcends words,” Jill Biden stated. “And as each dish comes to the table, so, too, does the meaning behind it.”
Menus for state dinners have traditionally been shows of culinary diplomacy, generally that includes admiring nods to the guests’ delicacies and sometimes showcasing the bounty of America’s farms and fields. Thursday’s menu does each in decadent spades. It consists of the Francophile contact of a pre-dessert cheese course, although with “American artisanal cheeses” for a mixing of traditions. (They embody, the first girl boasted, a Rogue River Blue, the champion of the 2019 World Cheese Awards). And the first-course of lobster is accented with a tarragon sauce, which appears like an across-the-pond cousin of our visitor’s well-known Bernaise — together with a delicata squash ravioli and American osetra caviar.
That’s adopted by a “calotte of beef,” a lesser-known lower of well-marbled beef extra usually referred to as a “coulotte,” served with a shallot marmalade, triple-cooked potatoes, sunchokes, creamed watercress and a red-wine discount. The meal’s preparation was being overseen by White House Executive Chef Cristeta Comerford and White House Executive Pastry Chef Susie Morrison, veterans of a number of administrations.
It’s the first such affair — a conventional black-tie to-do — of this administration, which noticed White House socializing curtailed no-thank-you-very-much to the pandemic, so a bit additional scrutiny applies. Perhaps a well-manicured eyebrow will arch over the number of Maine lobster, a species that’s being dropped by sustainable seafood-accrediting organizations due to the hazard to the endangered North American proper whale. And an entree of beef, which is among the largest sources of greenhouse fuel, from a White House that’s made local weather change a precedence?
The wines being served are made stateside, however once more with a callback to France. The president is a teetotaler, however the first girl — who enjoys a glass of wine with dinner — made the choices. She opted for 2 Californians for dinner, a Newton unfiltered chardonnay from Napa Valley and a cabernet sauvignon from the Anakota vineyard in Sonoma County’s Knights Valley, adopted by a sparkler for dessert, a brut rosé from the Roederer Estate, a revered home that’s the American outpost of the French champagne maker.
Of course, the query on the thoughts of anybody with an curiosity within the gastronomic indulgences of the president was this: Would he serve ice cream, the dish he’s made his signature? Of course he did, although not the beachside cones he enjoys on the weekends, however a quenelle-shaped accent (an ooh-la-la flourish) to an orange chiffon cake, a charmingly retro candy stated to have been invented by a Los Angeles insurance coverage agent within the Nineteen Twenties. The dish appears to embody the tone of your entire meal: a bit bit old style, a bit bit fancy, inflected with the accents of each host and visitor.