TN: St Innocent 7 Springs

This is Zuni Cafe's signature dish, and I've seen a couple variants. The one Betsy used is from the Zuni Cafe cookbook, and is 3 pages long. I'm not typing all that, but a quick google found a short version:

We just got this book. Very good and interesting cookbook, with thought-provoking commentary. I have one objection. As is her habit, Betsy handed me the cookbook with some mini-Post-It=A9 notes to mark recipes I'd like her to try. And I quickly found nice fish, pork chop, rabbit, and other recipes I liked.

But what struck me were the specific wine references (by Gerald Ascher). The salmon suggested the 1998 Atlas Peak Sangiovese, the sea bbutt the '99 Sauzet Chbuttagne, the duck with prunes the '96 Cayrou Cahors, the pot-au-feu the '97 Laurent Gevrey VV, the pork chops a '99 CdR, etc. This bothers me for several reasons: 1) I said to Betsy "this must be 3-4 years old", as most of the wines were released then. You can certainly still find '99 Sauzet and '96 Cayrou, but the salt cod suggests the '00 Macon-Lugny Charmes (I buttume Cave de Lugny), which would probably be dead as a doornail (what a strange expression) if you could find it. 2) I don't mind specific suggestions, but they should be in context of suggestions, not one wine that someone should seek out. I like Ming Tsai's Blue Ginger, where suggestions are along the lines of "refreshing, bone-dry Chardonnay from Chablis (Domaine Moreau)" or "Bordeaux Blend (Quintessa, Pichon-Lalande)" No vintage worries, and a guide so a newbie could get a subsbreastute easily. I can see someone going to 15 shops looking for a '98 Altas Peak and then giving up on the whole idea of pairing wines. 3) Some of the suggestions ('99 Quivira Dry Creek Cuvee, '99 St. Amant Amador Roussanne,etc) would have been tough to find even 3 years ago, what good is that kind of suggestion? Just a recipe for frustration. 4) Dominique Laurent- not with my pot-au-feu! Ok, so last one is unfair, just my personal tastes. But still to me the wine suggestions, done like this, subtract from the value of the book.

Hope you enjoy recipe. Now go kick Mothra's (and the Smog Monster's) buttes!