June 4, 2026 Marigold Heinrich Wine Dinner
This was an amazing experience. Marigold, in tiny Lyons believe it or not, hosted a dinner featuring wines from the Winery of Silvia Heinrich. They specialize in Blaufränkisch, Austria’s signature red grape. Martin did flight A, a selection of more traditional wines, and Bill did flight B, a bit more adventerous flight. The first documented wine was produced from this vineyard in 1767, so they’ve got their wines perfected 😉!
The menu and wine flights. We both picked the same 2nd and 4th courses, the pea soup and poached guinea hen. We did the Bonus Wine, the ‘kind of blue’ with the dessert course, its a very different kind of bubbly, one not produced using methode champenoise.
Flight A is at the left, flight B on the right. We took home 2 of the ‘kind of blue’ and 1 of the orange heinrich ‘graue freyheit’.
The first course - Potatoes rösti with herbs and trout caviar
The potatoes are topped with sour cream, chives, and and trout caviar. Wow, what a combination, sharp sour cream, fresh chives, and the trout caviar are being shown off on the background canvas of potatoes.
Bill says this is comparable to Frasca’s Frico Caldo.
The first of the flight A, the 24 Heinrich ‘naked white’ is a very fruity white blend with citrus forward.
Bill says the first of flight B, the 23 heinrich ‘weisze freyheit’ has a bit of pineapple and is definitely brighter than mine.
The second course - Pea Soup
Something as ordinary as pea soup?? This is no ordinary pea soup! It is an incredibly smooth, chilled pea soup, seasoned subtly and perfectly. Then drizzled with olive oil and the goat cheese is a very soft, creamy, rich cheese that contrasts with the very bright spring flavor of the soup. It’s topped with a couple of basil bits and it all was incredible.
The second of the flight A, the 24 Heinrich ‘naked red’ is a very fruity red blend with citrus forward.
The second of flight B, the 24 heinrich ‘pinot freyheit’ is very citrusy.
The third course - Butterfly Pasta with spinach and alpine cheese fondue
This pasta dish tried to steal the show! The pasta was more al dente than we had ever tried and that is the way to prepare pasta. The spinach was processed to a paste and was very mild. I think the whole dish was meant to show off the cheese fondue. We’d never had anything like this, perfectly smooth, pure essence of alpine cheese, rich, nutty and buttery. Somehow there was a hint of citrus in it.
The third of the flight A, the 24 Heinrich ‘graue freyheit’ is very orange and in the right glass. Bill says this one wins. It is very fruity with good acidity, it was so good that we picked it for our 3rd take home bottle.
The third of flight B, the 24 heinrich ‘muskat freyheit’ is very citrusy and its in the left glass.
Both wines managed to pair perfectly with the pasta!
The fourth course - Poached guinea hen with leeks, potatoes and horseradish
Martin is always skeptical of horseradish, but this guinea hen needed it. The hot horseradish, and the very savory hen complement each other perfectly.
The fourth of flights A and B, the 19 Heinrich ‘leithaberg’ is, as the winemaker told us, a very lightly constructed red wine with plenty of fruit and it actually worked very well with the hen.
The dessert course - Cherry clafoutis with custard cream
This is a differenct take on clafoutis, they used a crepé for the crust, that really took it up a level. The custard cream was perfect and it was served hot, with just the one dish for both of us. They found some really big cherries and to keep them very juicy, they didn’t pit them.
The big cherry flavor against the backdrop of crepé and cream was dreamy.
We did the bubbly ‘kind of blue’ with this.