Seeing Clearly Now

Virtual Vittles Local restaurant and winery inspire families to cook via social media By Laura Latzko

During the state’s stay-at-home order, many families have been struggling with what to make for dinner. Local business owners have sought to inspire others through virtual cooking lessons via Facebook.

Among those are David Borrego of Glendale’s Urban Margarita and Peggy Fiandaca and Curt Durham of LDV Winery in Scottsdale.

Urban Margarita has had cooking lessons for the public since last fall, but going virtual has been a new experience for Borrego.

“For me, it was a way to give back to all of our regular guests who always attend our classes. While we are having this COVID-19 pandemic, it allows people to see a class and get to know some of our food,” Borrego says.

LDV Winery temporarily closed its tasting room in March due to coronavirus concerns. Doing the cooking sessions allows the owners to continue to interact with their customers.

“We don’t have an opportunity, except for something like this, to connect with our customers and connect with people who have come into our tasting rooms on a regular basis. … We’re all about that connection to our lands, connection to the people who drink our wine,” Fiandaca says.

Borrego’s wife, Kimberly Newhart, says the online cooking lessons can give families fresh ideas for what to cook at home together. The cooking lessons have been going live at 2 p.m. Fridays.

“They can cook as a family and make creative meals with some food that they have in their kitchen,” Newhart says.

Although it has hosted a supper club series, this is the first time LDV Winery has offered step-by-step instructions on how to cook recipes. In March, it hosted a wine release party via Zoom. The winery’s cooking lessons have been going live at 4 p.m. Thursdays.

The two establishments’ cooking classes have attracted out-of-state viewers from

During virtual cooking lessons, David Borrego of Urban Margarita has been demonstrating simple recipes that viewers can prepare at home. (Photo by Susie Timm)

New Jersey, Pennsylvania, California, New Mexico, North and South Carolina, Texas, Colorado, Illinois and Oregon.

During their cooking lessons, Fiandaca and Durham have discussed which wines pair well with certain foods.

“All of our wines are food-friendly wines. When we are producing wines, we want to make sure that someone can sit down for a multicourse meal and have one of our wines with every course,” Fiandaca says.

Customers can purchase individual wines or packages from the winery to try during the cooking lessons.

Borrego has discussed wine and margarita pairings during his videos.

Both establishments have tried to cater their cooking lessons to different skill levels. Borrego says even amateur cooks can follow the recipes he shares.

“The recipes I am utilizing are pretty simple. I don’t want to make them any harder than they need to be. There have a lot of simple ingredients. That’s the fun of it. People can either follow along or make it fairly easy,” Borrego says.

During the videos, Borrego will suggest different ways that families can change up the recipes with other ingredients or substitutes, especially if they aren’t able to find exact items such as hatch green chile.

“When I do the classes, I let them know that they can make them their own,” Borrego says.

Borrego has prepared dishes that are on Urban Margarita’s menu, like hatch green chile pork tamales, slow-cooked braised pork carnitas and braised prime short ribs.

Fiandaca and Durham have included some of their favorites, such as spicy shrimp pasta, flatbreads three ways, grilled ribeye steak with roasted potatoes, and pork tenderloin in a roasted pepper sauce with Mexican corn.

Prior to the sessions, the restaurants post ingredient lists online so viewers can ensure they have what they need.

Sometimes, Fiandaca and Durham have had to improvise during their cooking sessions. During one session, Fiandaca shared with viewers what to do if they don’t have enough chicken broth or don’t have chickpeas