The night I dined at Bouley the entryway was filled with shelves and shelves of macintosh apples, which put off an aroma reminiscent of a spa. What a comforting and welcoming entrance! The small lounge before the main dining room looks more like a fancy living room in a Newport mansion, with funny old-style french lounge chairs, than the entryway to one of New York’s finest restaurants. I was early so I ordered a glass of $20 pinot noir. A definite strike against them was that it took almost a minute for each dollar that glass cost to finally bring it to me, which was all the more absurd because I was the only person in the lounge and there were about 10 servers walking around aimlessly. Gladly, this proved to be the only service hiccup in the entire evening.
The dining room is beautiful and definitely evokes the intended feeling of being in an opulent estate in the French countryside. The room has two separate areas. The front area is bright with vaulted ceilings and tables spaced generously away from one another. The back dining area is much more intimate with dark wood and a library type vibe. The bathrooms are downstairs, and my friend rightfully insisted that a visit to them is absolutely necessary. You walk down these grand marble stairs past the wine cellar and through a hallway of light colored marble and arched doorways. The vibe downstairs was enough to make me want to move in.
The menu choice is either a la carte or a tasting menu of six courses, which has a bit of a high price point at $175 per person. We went a la carte and, as I was still full the next morning, I believe that we made the right choice. The amuse bouche was a pumpkin soup with roasted chestnuts and a rice paper packet with pine nuts in it. This was exactly the warming and comforting introduction I needed on the windy, rainy day we went. They brought two amuse rolls, one was rosemary and the other had some sort of fruit in it (I think apple). Both were awesome with a crunchy crust and soft interior.
Then I was sent into an absolutely overwhelmed state. They proceeded to roll a bread cage over to our table for what would be the first of many visits. Yes, I said bread cage. It was this cart with about 8 different types of bread to choose from. The bread cart driver sliced your selection tableside and just grabbed another from his cage when a loaf ran out. My friend Jen and I both had a slice of garlic bread and a slice of fig bread to start. On the second visit, my friend couldn’t resist trying the pistachio hazelnut bread and I am glad she couldn’t because it proved to be my favorite of the breads we had. All the breads the entire evening were absolutely outrageous good. In many ways, it seems with all the fanfare surrounding the bread cart the restaurant wants the bread to be the standout item of the evening. The remainder of the food was very good, but when someone mentions Bouley my first thought will always be the bread.
For an appetizer I had shrimp, sea scallops, dungeness crab, and calamari in a herbal broth and Jen had tuna with turnip and radish in a yuzu-miso dressing. All of the seafood on my dish was perfectly cooked. There were two shrimp, one was simply grilled and the other was fried. The scallop was pan-fried to be crispy and it looked like they had been partially pushed through a large grater with the top was split into many cubes. The calamari was stuffed and just awesome. All of this was served atop a bed of crab with a green herb broth. The dish and the broth were extremely tasty. My friend Jen's was also really good, but a bit generic. I love yuzu and miso, but there was nothing in the dish that made it extraordinary.
For my main, I had the Chicken with Carrot Ravioli, hen of the woods mushrooms, and Pain d’épice dressing. Jen had the roasted duck with white truffle honey, chanterelles, asparagus, and porcini puree. Hands down Jen’s dish won. That’s not to say my chicken wasn’t extraordinary. It was certainly the most tender piece of chicken ever, so much so that I was cutting it with my fork. And the ravioli, which is what really made me order the dish in the first place was amazing. The idea of a sweet carrot puree in pasta is just pure genius. And the pain d’epice sauce, which is a gingerbread spice type mixture, was really wonderful but I would have liked more. I know after that description you’re wondering how Jen’s dish could have been better. Well, Jen's had this white truffle honey sauce that was outstanding and without a doubt one of the best sauces I’ve had in a while. And the duck itself was insanely tender and delicious.
For a pre-dessert they brought melon soup with ricotta sorbet which really wasn’t for me. There are a few things that shouldn’t be made into a liquid and I think melon is one of them. I also was not at all a fan of the ricotta sorbet, as it just wasn’t as sweet as I’d like a frozen dessert to be. For dessert, we had the chocolate frivolous. This was a smorgasbord of all things chocolate…a chocolate brulee, a hazelnut Dacquoise, a noutgatine, a warm chocolate lava cake, a rich chocolate ice cream, and another ice cream that had what tasted like prunes in it. When it arrived, my first thought was it was too much on one plate. But I liked every component and couldn’t possibly pick one to remove!
After our dessert, our server brought a silver tower of petit fours. The petit fours included carrot spice macaroons, rich butter cookies covered in white and dark chocolate, coconut lemon wafer cookies, a truffle, and sesame sandwich cookies. I’m not sure if I was so full that I just couldn’t enjoy these or whether they were only average, but there was nothing that stood out from the tower that I wanted to have again. Maybe it was all that bread!
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Friday, December 9, 2011
Eleven Madison Park
In the realm of making a night feel special, Eleven Madison knocks it right out of the park (albeit a park much larger than its little namesake). Everything is at a calm, relaxed pace that once you sit down at your table, you feel as if it’s yours for the rest of the night. The food is inventive and interesting new presentations of classic dishes. All four of the courses we had were extremely good and the majority of them made lasting impressions. The food definitely would stand out on its own but with the level of service the experience was raised to a whole new level.
The Executive Chef is Daniel Humm, and his concept is a grid menu that lists only the primary ingredient of every choice. For each of the four courses, you have four choices so the menu looks like a little square grid of words. After you order, the waiter asks if there is anything that you aren’t fond of so that they can tailor your dishes around your likes/dislikes. You can also opt for a larger chef tasting menu, but honestly there was plenty of food in the four course menu that more is unnecessary. We also did the wine pairing, which was definitely one of the best values of wine pairings I’ve ever had. We had two drinks prior to the first course, and then we had a glass with each course including dessert. All of the pairings were spot-on and each wine was immensely interesting and thoughtful.
Not only were there two drinks before our first course, but there were three rounds of small appetite teasers from the kitchen. The first were airy gougeres, mushroom tea with lemon verbena and toasted truffle brioche. The gourgeres were wonderful, but we both were not fond of the brioche toasts and the topping that had a dry, unpleasant texture. The next round of bites was scallop ceviche with blood orange presented in a scallop shell and raw tuna with pepper and basil powder. Both of these were awesome. The third round of little bites was a yogurt pop with fried fennel seeds and madras curry powder coated in goat’s milk butter and then a little piece of fried fish with aioli. The presentation on all of these was gorgeous and playful, right down to with the pops sticking out of a vase with tall grass.
After these three bites, the bread arrived with a choice of cow’s or goat’s milk butter. The bread was extraordinary with no other way to describe it other than to say it was a warm and buttery bread/croissant hybrid.
And then our meal began. I believe we had been there for over an hour at this point! My first course was fluke. The fluke preparation that evening was fluke carpaccio with dried apples, celery, and chives. I adored the thin slices of melt in your mouth fluke with the apple flavor. My friend’s first course was the Langoustine with green apple and celeriac. This was extremely tender and the flavors were outstanding. We both agreed though that the fluke was the better dish.
For my second course I chose the endive with truffle, egg yolk, and pear. I can’t even begin to describe how wonderful this insanely tender endive was. I find it incredibly impressive when a chef can make vegetables taste this amazing. My friend chose the Loup de Mer, which was okay but a bit on the disappointing side as none of the flavors really tasted like they came together.
The third course for my friend was sous vide guinea fowl with salsify puree and jus. This was another wow dish. The fowl was so tender and paired sensationally well with the fabulous salsify puree. I love salsify and think it is one of the most under-used vegetables out there. My third course was pork with roasted plum, onion soubise, and amoretti crumbs. The pork was incredibly tender, the onion soubise was buttery fabulousness, and the almond flavored crumbs added such a nice sweet, nutty layer of flavor.
After our final savory course, our waiter rolled over a little cart and proceeded to mix up a homemade orange egg cream for us. He explained that the restaurant likes to take old fashioned New York hometown favs and bring them back. Well, if they keep serving these, there is no doubt in my mind that the egg cream will make a rapid comeback.
For the dessert course, my friend had the Pistachio that was a Pistachio cheesecake with pistachio sponge cakes, grape sorbet, and pistachio crumble. I had the Chocolate which was Hazelnut mousse coated in guandija chocolate atop a bed of caramel crumble served with espresso ice cream and sponge. The pistachio won the dessert war hands down. I thought the chocolate dessert was good, but there was something missing from it for me. On the other hand, the pistachio had everything and I couldn’t get enough of the grape sorbet.
Then the absolute best part of the evening arrived. My friend and I were invited back to the kitchen for a tour. The kitchen was immaculate and exuded an absolute state of calm and efficiency. We were brought to a station where we could watch everything while someone made a cocktail using liquid nitrogen for us. I can’t remember 100% what it consisted of but there were diced apples, some frozen apple brandy, and some sort of foam made into a ball in the liquid nitrogen. It was awesome. They also let us flip through a copy of their brand new cookbook, which is just as beautiful as everything else that night and now on my Christmas wish list.
When they brought us back to our table they left a bottle of cognac for us to sip as much of as we wanted at our leisure. The petit fours that night were a fruit gelee with chocolate, a raspberry linzer tart, pistachio and rose macaroon, and a lemon shortbread tart. The standouts of these were the raspberry tart and the lemon shortbread tart which were both awesome. As we paid our bill, they presented us with envelopes that had the menu and the full explanation and paired wine for the dishes we ordered and also left me with a jar of granola and explained that they give one to every woman that dines with them. I finished my jar the other day and its one of many reasons I want to go back to Eleven Madison.
Find a reason to go
The Executive Chef is Daniel Humm, and his concept is a grid menu that lists only the primary ingredient of every choice. For each of the four courses, you have four choices so the menu looks like a little square grid of words. After you order, the waiter asks if there is anything that you aren’t fond of so that they can tailor your dishes around your likes/dislikes. You can also opt for a larger chef tasting menu, but honestly there was plenty of food in the four course menu that more is unnecessary. We also did the wine pairing, which was definitely one of the best values of wine pairings I’ve ever had. We had two drinks prior to the first course, and then we had a glass with each course including dessert. All of the pairings were spot-on and each wine was immensely interesting and thoughtful.
Not only were there two drinks before our first course, but there were three rounds of small appetite teasers from the kitchen. The first were airy gougeres, mushroom tea with lemon verbena and toasted truffle brioche. The gourgeres were wonderful, but we both were not fond of the brioche toasts and the topping that had a dry, unpleasant texture. The next round of bites was scallop ceviche with blood orange presented in a scallop shell and raw tuna with pepper and basil powder. Both of these were awesome. The third round of little bites was a yogurt pop with fried fennel seeds and madras curry powder coated in goat’s milk butter and then a little piece of fried fish with aioli. The presentation on all of these was gorgeous and playful, right down to with the pops sticking out of a vase with tall grass.
After these three bites, the bread arrived with a choice of cow’s or goat’s milk butter. The bread was extraordinary with no other way to describe it other than to say it was a warm and buttery bread/croissant hybrid.
And then our meal began. I believe we had been there for over an hour at this point! My first course was fluke. The fluke preparation that evening was fluke carpaccio with dried apples, celery, and chives. I adored the thin slices of melt in your mouth fluke with the apple flavor. My friend’s first course was the Langoustine with green apple and celeriac. This was extremely tender and the flavors were outstanding. We both agreed though that the fluke was the better dish.
For my second course I chose the endive with truffle, egg yolk, and pear. I can’t even begin to describe how wonderful this insanely tender endive was. I find it incredibly impressive when a chef can make vegetables taste this amazing. My friend chose the Loup de Mer, which was okay but a bit on the disappointing side as none of the flavors really tasted like they came together.
The third course for my friend was sous vide guinea fowl with salsify puree and jus. This was another wow dish. The fowl was so tender and paired sensationally well with the fabulous salsify puree. I love salsify and think it is one of the most under-used vegetables out there. My third course was pork with roasted plum, onion soubise, and amoretti crumbs. The pork was incredibly tender, the onion soubise was buttery fabulousness, and the almond flavored crumbs added such a nice sweet, nutty layer of flavor.
After our final savory course, our waiter rolled over a little cart and proceeded to mix up a homemade orange egg cream for us. He explained that the restaurant likes to take old fashioned New York hometown favs and bring them back. Well, if they keep serving these, there is no doubt in my mind that the egg cream will make a rapid comeback.
For the dessert course, my friend had the Pistachio that was a Pistachio cheesecake with pistachio sponge cakes, grape sorbet, and pistachio crumble. I had the Chocolate which was Hazelnut mousse coated in guandija chocolate atop a bed of caramel crumble served with espresso ice cream and sponge. The pistachio won the dessert war hands down. I thought the chocolate dessert was good, but there was something missing from it for me. On the other hand, the pistachio had everything and I couldn’t get enough of the grape sorbet.
Then the absolute best part of the evening arrived. My friend and I were invited back to the kitchen for a tour. The kitchen was immaculate and exuded an absolute state of calm and efficiency. We were brought to a station where we could watch everything while someone made a cocktail using liquid nitrogen for us. I can’t remember 100% what it consisted of but there were diced apples, some frozen apple brandy, and some sort of foam made into a ball in the liquid nitrogen. It was awesome. They also let us flip through a copy of their brand new cookbook, which is just as beautiful as everything else that night and now on my Christmas wish list.
When they brought us back to our table they left a bottle of cognac for us to sip as much of as we wanted at our leisure. The petit fours that night were a fruit gelee with chocolate, a raspberry linzer tart, pistachio and rose macaroon, and a lemon shortbread tart. The standouts of these were the raspberry tart and the lemon shortbread tart which were both awesome. As we paid our bill, they presented us with envelopes that had the menu and the full explanation and paired wine for the dishes we ordered and also left me with a jar of granola and explained that they give one to every woman that dines with them. I finished my jar the other day and its one of many reasons I want to go back to Eleven Madison.
Find a reason to go
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