After the food was sampled with the wines, several adjustments to each course made the matches work more smoothly, offering an object lesson for cooks who want to build bridges between their food and the wines on the menu. With the lamb and eggplant dish, for example, the Basil Sabayon sauce tended to make the young red taste too sharp. The remedy was easy. Add vinegar, which tends to soften the wines. Also, make sure the sauce is not undersalted.
Sufficient salt tends to soften the tannins in a young red wine.
The dish in this menu simplifies the idea and creates a crispy crust to play off the wines' textures. I went with braised squab for the older wines because of the proven track record both of braised dishes and those involving dark-meat poultry matched with mature Cabernet. The polenta served with the squab is mixed with Swiss chard. Not only does gold polenta streaked with green look good, but the earthy flavors of the vegetable echo the earthy flavors in the older wines. Again, don't forget to use sufficient salt, which helps balance even the modest tannins remaining in mature reds.