Also known as “verjuice”, verjus is the pressed juice of unripened grapes. While acidic, verjus has a gentler flavor than vinegar, with a sweet-tart taste that is often used to heighten the flavor of many sauces or mustards. A definitive culinary ingredient indigenous to wine-producing regions of the world, it has a wide variety of uses in the kitchen. It’s most commonly used to deglaze sauté pans, however Verjus can also be used to add acidity and freshness to sauces; for poaching fish, or to season vegetables, fruits and salad. The word verjus derives from the French term vert jus, literally “green juice”, which refers to its source—the high-acid, low-sugar grapes that winemakers thin from the vines just when the crop is beginning to ripen. This early crop of unripe grapes is pressed, resulting in verjus. Unlike wine, however, verjus is not fermented, and is not alcoholic, meaning that its use in a salad dressing or sauce will not interfere with the flavor of the accompanying drinking wine. Noble Handcrafted works solely with a single-source family farm in Oregon’s best pinot noir producing region to create a perfectly balanced verjus for all of your cooking needs.
