Making up for lost time

Well, I clearly did not keep up with any posting at all during the school year. Now that it's over, I should probably get back to it, huh?

I'll start out with our trip to NYC last December. We went to Momofuku, of course (both Noodle Bar and Ssam Bar--Ssam Bar is WAY better), but also tried some new places.

First, we went to Lupa on a totally freezing cold day. I think I got frostbite on my eye. The food was delicious, especially the marinated beef tongue, sardines, and pastas. The best part, though, was the tasting of amari:




We also went to Tailor, which I enjoyed a lot. I love the idea of restaurants that take risks with food, and push the boundaries of flavor, but sometimes you end up with results that don't work so well (like a few courses at WD-50). I found that everything was at least good, and some things were spectacular. Here it is!

Chestnut soup with razor clams and potato:


Scallop tartare, pickled litchi sorbet, asian pear:


Maple poached snails, bacon, parsley, toast--OMG, totally amazing


Sesame sweetbreads, banana puree, purple mustard:


Loup de mer, pear consomme, sunchokes, pickled crosnes--perfect fish, awesome flavors!


Black garlic chicken, long beans, shitake mushrooms--the black garlic was really interesting, chicken had a great texture, and the sauce was delicious


Miso butterscotch pork belly--holy crap this was good, just an unbelievable combination of savory and sweet


Cantaloupe sorbet, serrano ham (like a cracker), sherry:


Grapefruit, tarragon, and some kind of custard/flan (can't remember, and it's not on the menu--arrrrghhh!!)


Apple, crumble, and some other stuff I can't remember, but I do remember it was super tasty!

L'Espalier

Went to check out L'Espalier's new space in the Mandarin Oriental last night. It's a very nice, modern-looking set of rooms, but doesn't quite have the charm of the old townhouse. We opted for the chef's tasting journey (at a whopping $185 per person, and an additional $110pp for wine pairings).

Hors d'oeuvres were mini smoked salmon napoleons with creme fraiche. Yummy, but not particularly exciting.

Amuse of oxtail salad with cucumber, filo shell, truffled carmelized onion, and sriracha.

Island Creek Oyster with jam and caviar, paired with Duvel Leroy champagne.

Sole with apples, crisp apple skin, caviar, radish, maitake mushroom puree, paired with a 1989 white rioja (really nice pairing)

Butter poached lobster with chestnut pear soup, brussels sprout leaves, caviar, and truffle oil. Paired with an Italian wine from Alto Adige (Kerner was the varietal, I believe), like a very floral riesling.

Monkfish with candy cane beet, butternut squash sauce, and a white wine I don't remember

Seared foie gras with sweet potato and cranberries. Very good, but not the best foie ever. Paired with a really yummy sauternes. I think the wine was better than the food for this course. It was ridiculously good.

Herbed gnocchi with mushrooms, white truffles, and beef shin broth, paired with a Barolo. The gnocchi were soooooo good, and I'm glad we got to try the white truffles, because now I won't have to wonder what they taste like. They are good, but not spectacular, so I won't end up spending a ridiculous amount of money buying them.

Lamb with the tiniest puy lentils known to man, with a delicious mustardy sauce; squab with celery root puree, and buttery garlicy carrot and turnip, topped with a mustard green leaf, paired with a Margaux. The meats were fantastic.

Very nice cheese course--six completely different cheeses with a red banyuls.

Dessert of chocolate log, cranberry souffle, something that was supposed to be a pate sable (more like a stick of butter--ugh), and a meringue-like thing. As expected, paired with the Banfi brachetto d'aqui. I think the dessert was too rich and didn't sit very well with me.

Overall, a very good meal, but way too expensive in my opinion. I'd much rather have no caviar (it really didn't add anything) and an extra course instead. I think if I were spending my own money, I'd go to Clio 9 times out of 10 (probably 10 out of 10, really). The wine pairings were really nice, though, which I think is the biggest thing that Clio lacks.

Old Cambridge Haunts

Went to East Coast Grill for dinner last night. We hadn't been in a while, and last time was for Hell Night. We had the fried calamari, which was really good, especially with its accompaniment of mint, cilantro, and chili garlic dipping sauce. Fried chicken livers were also good, if a bit overdone. They came with a delicious mix of chard, orange marmalade, and lime (and probably some other ingredients). It was a great sweet and sour dish. Mussels were also very good in a ginger lemongrass sauce, and the grilled sirloin was fine, but nothing special. We sat in front of the oyster shucker, who was very friendly.

Afterward, we met some friends at the Cellar, another Cambridge spot we hadn't visited in quite some time. I forgot how cheap it is compared to other places in Boston--at one point we ordered a round of 8 drinks and it was $37!!!! I love Cambridge!

More on SF

Okay, so if you haven't had enough of San Francisco, here's some of the food we ate.

First, the Slanted Door.

We started with grapefruit salad with candied pecans, really refreshing and intensely flavored:


Kona kampachi--possibly my new favorite fish, although I'm not sure it has replaced a great piece of yellotail:


Clams with basil and chilis. Mmmmmm.


Hamachi collar--this was probably the best one I've ever had. A ton of meat, perfectly cooked with a crispy exterior and tender, juicy, melty interior. Came with pickled papaya and a great soy dipping sauce. So so so so good.


Pork with rice noodles:


We had a great bartender who was from Boston. Drinks were really tasty, and went really well with the food. In particular, we liked the Indian Summer (gin, elderflower and grapefruit juice) and the Hotel Nacional Special (Barbancourt 8yr rum, lime, pineapple gomme, Orchard apricot brandy).

It was so good, we went back the next day for lunch:

Turnip cake:


Cellophane noodles with crab (tons of fresh crab meat, soooooooo yummy):


We also had a salad with shredded green cabbage, chicken, and rice noodles. Good, but not as good as the grapefruit salad. An order of the hamachi collar was just as delicious as the day before.

"Pimms" cup with homemade "Pimms". A really pretty, interesting, tasty drink.


For dessert, cherry tomatoes and buttermilk sorbet. A really nice light dessert.


The Slanted Door was not at all like we expected--it had a much more modern feel, great food and drinks, and very affordable. We loved it.

Drinking in SF

We managed to hit up a few great bars in San Francisco.

We went to the Slanted Door for two lunches, but I'll post those later with photos.

Bourbon and Branch is a bit of a pain in the neck if you want to sit at the main bar, since you have to make reservations, but the woman I talked to never called back. However, the library didn't require reservations, and was a nice room through the back of the bar. Lots of dark wood, old books, and candles.
We started with the traditional Revolver and a tequila drink (El Diablo). Then, we got an old fashioned and a Genevieve drink that also had lemon juice, orange juice, sweet and dry vermouths. Finally, we finished with a negroni variation: aperol, gin, and lillet. All were really good, but I think our favorites were the Genevieve drink and the "negroni".

On another day, after a long walk through the city to Golden Gate Park, we stopped at The Alembic for some refreshment:

Perfect Storm: Goslings rum, tawny port, and beer, served in a tea cup with a clove-studded lemon. Cute presentation, and very tasty.
Bolo tie: silver tequila, miso white peach puree, sparkling wine. Interesting twist on a bellini.
Macanudo: anejo tequila, apricot eau de vie, Qi smoked black tea liquor, and agave. This was soooooo good and very complex.
Vow of Silence: Wild Turkey rye, benedictine, creme de griotte (like cherry), and bitters.
Boutonniere: Scotch, nocino, and orange bitters.
Old Fashionista: aged cachaca, smoked maple syrup, house-made sasperilla bitters, soda, and lemon. Very funky and interesting.

We then went off-menu with excellent bartender Thomas Waugh, and got a drink with stone pine liquor, an attempt at a Hierba Buena (his entry in the Averna competition that won him a trip to Sicily--the glass wasn't right), a different Averna drink with simple, lemon, ginger beer, and mint (so delicious), a vieux carre, and a nightcap whose ingredients I can't remember.

At Alembic, we also snacked on za'atar potato chips, crispy tripe, octopus carpaccio, beet salad, and tomato burrata avocado salad. Yum.







Of note was that despite SF's reputation as an expensive city, we found food and drink prices to generally be lower than Boston, and certainly lower than NY.

Fleur de Lys, San Francisco

We're in San Francisco for a few days, and are busy eating and drinking our way around the city. Last night we had dinner at Fleur de Lys, where we opted for the four course menu.

Amuse:
Butternut squash soup with lentil salad.
A nice tasty bite to start the meal

Course 1:
a. Tasting of Alsatian Choucroute: Choucroute soup, toasted spaetzel, and paprika oil; Choucroute fondant with Osetra caviar (so yummy, like a cauliflower flan); Choucroute strudel with sauteed foie gras (wow, this was amazing).
b. Sweetbreads with morels, sauteed leeks, farm egg, and veal jus. Just delicious.

Course 2: Fish
a. King salmon with marcona almonds, sweet and sour radicchio, grapes, scallion oil, and polenta (very good flavors, but the fish was a bit overcooked for our taste)
b. Sea bass with pimento butter, leeks, olive oil mashed potatoes, purple olive jus, and spicy fried artichokes (so good, the potatoes were spectacular!)

Course 3: Main
a. Buffalo strip steak, vegetables, and lemongrass sauce (great flavor, and the sauce was delicious)
b. Wagyu beef cheeks with butternut squash and celery root puree (amazing beef, and the celery root was so smooth and creamy).

Course 4: Dessert
a. Pistachio cake with apricot (roasted with grand marnier), amaretto ice cream (good, but not spectacular)
b. "Fleurburger" a dark chocolate patty with strawberry and kiwi garnish on a bun, banana shake, kiwi "pickle", fennel ice cream "frites" (very cute and fun)

Overall, we thought this meal was a very good value. The food was generally very tasty and interesting, while very French. We had a good Trimbach Pinot Gris, a couple glasses of red, and a Quarts de Chaume dessert wine. Service was nice, although the main course came out way too fast. I don't think we would have been disappointed with any of the menu items--they all sounded really good!

Eating in the 'burbs

There was a review of Blue Ginger in Wellesley in the Globe the other day, and it generated a decent number of mixed comments from readers. One person mentioned that it was a "solid option" for those in the suburbs who don't like to go downtown. Do people in the 'burbs really settle more for lesser food? Many people on eGullet complain about chain restaurants and the number of people who love crappy food, but it seems that sub-par places in the city are just as popular as the good ones. PF Changs is packed, Cheesecake Factory has ridiculous waits, and I'm sure Olive Garden would attract hoardes of visitors if one existed in Boston.
In any case, I'd like to find the good neighborhood places outside of Boston. A number of Boston chefs have started opening restaurants in the suburbs, but there must be some good neighborhood places that just go unnoticed because they aren't in the city. I'll start keeping track of the good (and bad) ones as I find them. Here are a few places we've visited recently:

Blue Ribbon BBQ
Many people, even city folks, know about Blue Ribbon. They have really good ribs, pulled pork, burnt ends, and varied sides, among other items. Almost everything we've tried has been delicious.

Sweet Tomatoes Pizza
One in Newton Center and one in West Newton, this is one of my favorite pizza places. Super thin crust, but still nice and chewy, with fresh toppings. I think my favorite is spinach, garlic, and sausage. Mmmmmmm. The pesto veggie is also very good, but sometimes a bit oily.

Paddy O's
One drawback of the suburbs (in my opinion) is the lack of good bars within stumbling distance. Obviously, with the higher number of families and lower population density, this makes sense, but I still don't like it. The first place we tried, which shall remain nameless because I didn't bother remembering the name, was blah at best. We checked out Paddy O's the other night, and it was surprisingly good. It wasn't a particularly lively scene, but they had a decent selection of beer on tap, and the food was good for the price, if not great. The reuben had tender meat, good flavor, and came with crisp tasty fries, and the nachos were generously topped with real cheese, chili, good tomatoes, and sour cream and salsa on the side. (The olives and jalapenos were from a can, and not that great, so I pushed them aside.)

Do I like these places compared to places in the city? I'd certainly drive out to Newton for Blue Ribbon or Sweet Tomatoes, but I wouldn't go too far out of my way to drink beer and eat bar food.

Capital Grille

Went to the Capital Grille in Boston tonight. I had been once a few years ago, and I remember that it was unmemorable, but I wanted to give it another try. I started with lobster bisque (super rich with large chunks of tender lobster, and topped with sherry tableside), and had the kona crusted sirloin as my entree. I normally have rib-eye as my steak of choice, but the sirloin came highly recommended. It was really delicious, very flavorful, and came with shallot butter. We had a side of steamed broccoli with red pepper sauce (where sauce=butter), also very yummy. Ravenswood Zinfandel went nicely with the steak.
We tried to skip dessert but our friendly waiter brought us a complementary flourless chocolate espresso cake. I was so full, but managed a few bites, and it was insanely good.

Neptune Oyster

So after our sub-par New Orleans oyster experience, we were craving some "real" oysters (sorry NOLA, we love ya, but your oysters are yucky). We've been wanting to go to Neptune Oyster for a while, and finally made it yesterday.

Menus:


Started out with several varieties:
Island Creeks, kumamotos, Royal Miyagi, and two other kinds I can't remember :-(


Blue marlin tartare, with stone fruit, pea puree, and parmesan arancini (which was more like a patty). The tartare had ginger bits, and was extremely tasty.


Fried soft shell crab. Although the crab itself was just a tiny tad tough, the preparation was incredible. The avocado crab salad made a perfect bed for the fried crab, and the sweet corn provided a great sweet accompaniment.


We really enjoyed this meal. For drinks, we had glasses of muscadet and chenin blanc with the oysters (muscadet was a great match). With the soft shell crab, we asked to split a glass of the d'Arenberg hermit crab. The waitress gave us two very generous half glasses of this very tasty wine. Overall, we felt this was a very good value, and we're really glad we finally made it!

Eating at Tales (aka what we did when we weren't drunking)

People aren't kidding when they say New Orleans has great food. We ate some fantastic food, but I wish we could have tried more. Here's my best attempt to remember all our meals:
Started out at Napolean House. Great atmosphere, exactly what you'd think of a New Orleans institution. The muffaletta was quite good, but I can imagine a better one (it was a bit doughy). Jambalaya and gumbo were very tasty.

Afternoon snack at Acme Oyster:
Oysters were not very good, in my opinion...bland and mushy. I highly prefer East or West coast oysters:

Oyster po-boy was pretty tasty though:


Dinner at Cochon. Oh my, this place is sooooooo good. We tried almost every appetizer, a bunch of entrees, several sides, and desserts too. Also, we had a great sparkling gruener veltliner, some other wine, and got into a shot war with a table of New Yorkers. More good times. Anyway, it was so good, we went back two nights later and got some pictures:
Fried pig ear: nice texture, decent flavor, but I still prefer chinese style...


Fried rabbit liver with pepper jelly and mint. WOW. I could eat many, many orders of this:


Head cheese, compliments of the chef. Possibly the best I've ever tried. So soft and flavorful:


Pickled pork tongue with tomato salad. Great flavor on the tongue (haha), but the tomatoes were a bit unripe:


Ribs with pickled watermelon rind. The meat was juicy and tender, and the sweet, tangy watermelon rind made a great accompaniment:


Crawfish pie. Also very yummy, the pastry was fantastic:


Jalapeno spoonbread with okra and beans: probably my least favorite dish, but still quite good:


Crawfish and green tomato casserole: incredibly good. The sides at Cochon are amazing.


Eggplant and shrimp: this may have been the best thing we ate all trip. It's a mixture of eggplant, shrimp, grits, peppers, scallions, and topped with cheese. It is so ridiculously good, I can't even explain it.


I was too full to appreciate dessert the first night, and we didn't even try on the second visit.

Thursday lunch didn't sit well with me (I can't imagine why, after only ~15 drinks the day before). We went to Mr. B's Bistro for the bbq shrimp and pasta jambalaya. They tasted good enough that I wanted to go back when I was in better shape, which we did a couple days later.

bbq shrimp in New Orleans is basically jumbo shrimp swimming in a butter and pepper sauce. So messy and delicious, with bread to soak up the sauce. This isn't diet food!


Mr B's also makes a great pasta jambalaya, with spinach fettuccini, really nice andouille sausage, shrimp, and chicken (dry and useless):


We also had dinner at Herbsaint, which has co-owners with Cochon. Although a bit fancier than Cochon, the food wasn't quite as good. Appetizers were generally solid, but some of the entrees were just okay.

Johnny's Po-boy: we got a hot sausage and a roast beef po-boy. I thought the hot sausage was unexpectedly delicious, but the roast beef was a bit dry.

Oh yeah, we also ate at Subway. Mmmmmm.

Lala Rokh

We went to Lala Rokh (Persian) in Beacon Hill for the first time the other night with a couple friends. The food was generally good, but they had a pretty big private party, so the kitchen was quite slow. We started with an eggplant and tomato appetizer, which also had some yellow peas or lentils, yogurt, and crispy caramelized shallot. I love eggplant, and really liked this starter. For entrees we had duck leg with a walnut pomegranate sauce (very interesting, tangy, sweet and rich, and the duck was very moist) and lamb with spinach and spices (good, but not as good as the duck).
While I enjoyed the food and company, and I'm certainly glad we tried it, I didn't think it was the best value. Entrees were $20-25, appetizers around $8-10. Not expensive, but I feel like we can get much better food for those prices. For example, I'd go to Tamarind Bay every time given the choice (not that Persian food is the same as Indian, but comparing quality, service, and presentation). It also reminds me how impressive it is when restaurants can produce really great food and service without charging a ton.

More old LJ stuff (2007)

Last night (Sunday), we went to Uni on the spur of the moment. There were actually seats at the sushi bar, so we sat there and ordered a sushi tasting menu. It was really, really good, and I wish I brought my camera because the presentations were gorgeousssssss ;-)

Started with the typical tomato water martini...so yummy.

Needlefish, watermelon radish, shiso vinaigrette

Rudderfish, red onion, garlic ponzu, pea tendril

Penshell, mango lassi, aji pepper, red shiso: served in a giant shell...the penshell is like a huge, very firm scallop.

Hobu (sea robbin?), spiced orange, blood orange slices, blood orange foam, jalepeno salt

Sea bream, toasted rice foam, japanese plum, onion sesame vinaigrette

Horse mackerel, sea grapes (like tiny bundles of caviar!), aji pepper, rhubarb: nice and fishy/meaty

Pink sea bream, japanese artichoke, red shiso/miso vinaigrette: one of my favorites

Uni, ginger shoots, purple rice flake, and yuzu: I requested this because I was craving uni...mmmmmmm

Bluefin o-toro, pickled mustard seeds, miso mignonette, caviar: this was ridiculously rich and good

Tuna tataki, seared foie gras, cilantro puree, aji dressing, pear & elderberry puree, pickled radish: two cubes of barely seared tuna topped with perfectly seared foie gras...WOW

Pineapple jasmine cloud, black sesame, raspberry coulis, green apple wasabi sorbet, kaffir lime cream and toasted rice: This dessert was awesome...so light, lots of flavors, but they all went together. The "cloud" was so tasty and had great texture.

Milk chocolate geode, hazelnut praline & sorbet, violet coulis, cassis meringue (eggless): the "geode" was made using a balloon and liquid nitrogen, and the hazelnut had a nice saltiness.

While the sushi was great and creative, I thought the desserts were really outstanding. We had a couple nice selections of sake too. Sunday night seems like a good time to go, since the sushi bar wasn't too crowded.