Alright my readers, time for another long over-due review. Eh, who am I kidding. My only two readers, Amanda my wife and Ariella my sister. Do you believe that!? Not even MY MOTHER reads my blog – granted, I never told her about this in the first place, but none-the-less…
So, a few weeks back my wife and I got together with a friend of mine from business school and his wife for a night out. Admittedly, neither Amanda nor I are very good at staying out late, hell I practically fall asleep by 9:45 when I’m back in Chicago – honestly. Well, we had a reservation for 9:30 or some ungodly hour on a Saturday night, and to make things worse, my wife decided to go against God and wear pants (Deuteronomy 22:5); I am not a pious man – probably even not a completely believing man, but religion does get things right ever once in a while… women only wearing skirts, I would have added only SHORT skirts 10 inches above the knee with some high heels!
Back to the story...so, the place we went to was Naha, located downtown right off Clark. First thing we observed was the valet right. NICE. Something like 12 dollars for <3 hours and 14 dollars for >3 hours. Perfect. I hope you all know my rule on valet. The price cannot exceed $3-4 more than the price of mass transit (this means always valet when you have more than 2 people in the car).
My wife being a huge lush concocted a plan with my friend’s wife to get there early and drink. We arrived sometime around 7:30 and waited a few minutes for our friends to get to Naha. In the mean time, the place was ok. A mix of urban trendy – which I dislike (think concrete floors) - and upscale. There was one weird aspect though. The place had its trendiness in style, but there were no hot chicks – sans my wife (yes, my friend’s wife was there too, but I only judge my wife and women I don’t know). I mean not even the hostesses were hot…really, the hostess…for crying out loud I think the Hooters hostesses are more attractive (we’re talking Chicago Hooters, not Florida Hooters).
A table at the bar opened up, the bar area was very expansive, and the four of us sat down some time around 7:50. This was nice, it turned out we could even order from those seats, sayonara 9:30 reservation.
Oh shit. Are you kidding me!? Seriously!? I was livid already and it wasn’t even 8:00. The bread, the FUCKING bread. I looked at my compatriots – fortunately our friends are as discerning as me, possibly more so – and I said something disparaging like “I can’t believe they just gave us Entenmann’s bread”, my wife piped up with “it’s probably Sarah Lee” – who knew I was married to a lush AND a comedienne? Our friends knew my dislike of bad bread. The night was so far a bit of a disappointment, no hot chicks and crappy bread, booooooo.
Tommy, the bar waiter, comes over to us, he seems to be a sincere guy and gives us each a few menus, both the regular and bar menu. “Arbitrage,” – huh, what was that, apparently our friends noticed an arbitrage deal going on between the two menus, the bar menu had a $12 oysters and $14 on the regular menu, they both had the same description. This night might turn out cheaper than expected (spoiler alert, I was wrong).
The drinks arrived, both our friends and my wife were very happy with their drinks (my wife had the Chardonnay and Riesling and both were nice, I can’t recall what our friends had).
Look, ya’ll know that I’m a fairly humble and subdued man, but let’s be honest, I’m a baller and anyone I hang out with is also a baller (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=baller). There was so much on the menu I wanted, I didn’t know what to get. A few of us noticed the “tasting menu available upon request” at the bottom of the menu, we decided to inquire. Tommy said it was 5.5 courses, Chef’s choice, for 125 a pop. Uhm, maybe. “Yes.” What!? Yes, to what…great Mike ordered the tasting menu, it’s not cool for one baller to do something and the other to decline, yes, I too got the tasting menu. My wife got the mushroom soup and the Quail while Mike’s wife got the Venison – medium rare (nice). We also had an appetizer of Foie Gras…mmm, close to perfection.
Wow, well this review is getting long already, let me start on all the food we had:
Foie Gras, Seared Scallop, Fennel and Turnip Soup with brioche grilled goat cheese, short ribs on grits with brussel sprouts, mushroom soup, gnocchi, risotto with bacon, oysters with béarnaise sorbet, whitefish with pepper mustard and crab, wild pacific cod, beef brisket, venison and quail. Well, I can’t really describe all this, if you check out the menu online you’ll see it.
Let’s cut to the chase. WOW. Foie Gras was good, my wife who doesn’t eat it liked it. Fennel and Turnip soup was ok, the grilled cheese was a tad coagulated. The grits on the short ribs were very good and Mike’s wife who doesn’t normally eat brussel sprouts or mushrooms actually enjoyed both. The mushroom soup was a bit eh and the gnocchi, quite frankly was actually subpar given the standard of the rest of the meal (probably a 6). Though what really ruined the meal was the risotto. I’ve actually made better at home. The oysters were ok, but the béarnaise sorbet…WOW, that put it into upper, upper echelon territory, damn that was good. I personally was not impressed with the whitefish, but Mike was, we’ll give that one a 7.5, I was NOT impressed with the wild pacific cod, the beef brisket was high quality, but Fat Willy’s Rib Shack, I think, makes a better beef brisket. The venison was delicious, as was the accoutrements that the venison came in. The quail, I thought fell a bit short, maybe a 5.5-6. My wife really liked it though.
Then we had dessert. I’ll be honest, I forget what everyone got, though I did get a rocky road sundae that was awesome. The female chef even came out to meet us but we all were so drunk on food that we didn’t do her any justice.
This place was great. Really. The bill was a bit much (we haven’t gone out since), but DEFINITELY worth it.
I’m giving this place a 9-9.5. I would advise patrons to not order the typical stuff, get the fancy stuff on the menu, you’ll be much happier.
CHICAGO LAND, go here, make it a mainstay of your dinning locales.
Good Eats my friends.
Friday, March 19, 2010
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Greek Islands
Great, I owe a couple of reviews….well, let’s start.
The evening of February 27th, my wife and I and some friends were hoping to finally get together for an evening out. Turns out, we couldn’t decide where. Was it going to Matsuya, Dunlays on Clark, or another. Well at first we weren’t going to do Greek, but we all agreed at the end. HOWEVER, get this…there’s a Greek restaurant called Venus . Venus, for crying out loud. Now if there’s one thing I know (and believe you me, I know a WHOLE lot), it’s which Gods were Greek and which Roman. Venus is Roman, Aphrodite is Greek, for proof you may Wikipedia it. Unbelievable. My gut is some Italian who secretly enjoys Greek food founded this place (the audacity, first you steal their beliefs, then you steal their food…I just hope they didn’t steal Moussaka – that stuff is terrible).
So we decide to go to Greek Islands. Here’s the thing, I love all of greektown for this one nuance – free valet. Honestly, I’m going to be spending a lot of money at your place, most likely, the least you can do is give me free valet or make it breakeven ($2.25 a head each way to commute via train means valet should be 10 bucks – now I’m willing to pay up for the service, so $12-$14 is about what I consider breakeven valet price).
We’ve got a large party, 8 folks, so we get there and tell the maître de that we’re here and our party is moments away. He tells us to notify him when the party gets here. Fine, whatever, I’ll indulge your desire to make me wait longer for saganaki. The party gets there, as I promised, mere moments later, at which point I inform the maître de that we’re all here. The waiting begins. The fucking waiting begins. Not a good way to start off the evening. We were promised it would take 20 minutes. It took 1h10m. LIVID, that’s what I was. It’s fine that it will take that long, JUST TELL ME. I’m at the bar sweating like a mad man because I guess the owners wanted to replicate Greek’s summer heat in Chicago.
We finally sit ourselves and the group is famished and without further ado (read: without reading the menu) we just start ordering stuff for appetizers. Well out comes the bread (5 minutes later). Ugh, the bread. And UGH, the butter. I’ve spoken about this many times, SHAKE IT UP, serve me good bread, or good butter, or preferably both. Granted they also served olive oil, but it was a little too standard for me. The bread was a regular bread loaf with sesame seeds on it and the butter was the kind you get in the small package that you need to tear off the plastic film. It’s a Greek restaurant, please, please, please give me some sweet Churek. Thumbs DOWN.
Some of the appetizers start arriving, we’ve got a mix of stuff including: Gryos (better than expected, not the frozen crap), Saganaki (surprisingly GI has among the best Saganaki in Chicago), Tzatziki sauce (very good), and a Greek Salad (terrible, wilted lettuce, bad olives). Here’s the thing, we specially ordered some tzatziki and the worst thing possible happens, no pita chips come with the sauce, they expect us to put the sauce on the crap-ass bread they have. Are you kidding me? Get me so pita chips damnit! See, this is something the Mexican restaurants do well, whenever I’ve ordered any type of dip, the chips are in HUGELY abundant supply (just supply would work for greek restaurants), GREEK RESTAURANTS, LEARN FROM THIS.
Ugh, do I have to talk about this? The main courses. There was categorically NOTHING to write home about. Let's start with the fact that we ordered at 7:30 pm on a Saturday night and 3 of the daily specials weren't available. This might be worth knowing as the waiter takes our order. Tsk tsk. Anyways, my wife ordered the Mediterranean Sea bass (it’s only fresher 4700 miles away) – Mediterranean sea bass is bad, it has very little fat to it so it quickly dries out and loses its flavor, much like what happened at GI. I also got some lamb leg slices – those were bad, like really dried out brisket and I love lamb, very disappointing. We had another person get the meat pie. Not bad, the meat was flavorful, but there was surprisingly no basting sauce that was used. That’s surprising both good and bad. Good because the meat was still flavorful, bad because in a meat pie you usually want the pie aspect to soak up the sauce as well that way if you’re left with a bite without the meat you can still taste the juices. Someone else ordered the…ah, whatever, not even worth mentioning. I’m just gonna cut to the chase.
BREAD = 3. APPETIZERS = 6.5 (it was the saganaki and gyro that made it palatable), entrees = 4.5-6. Valet = 10.
Total Meal + Experience…drum roll. 4.5-5.5. I know, why so low? Well, all-in-all it was as expected with some kinda low hits and kinda high hits. Nothing special.
The evening of February 27th, my wife and I and some friends were hoping to finally get together for an evening out. Turns out, we couldn’t decide where. Was it going to Matsuya, Dunlays on Clark, or another. Well at first we weren’t going to do Greek, but we all agreed at the end. HOWEVER, get this…there’s a Greek restaurant called Venus . Venus, for crying out loud. Now if there’s one thing I know (and believe you me, I know a WHOLE lot), it’s which Gods were Greek and which Roman. Venus is Roman, Aphrodite is Greek, for proof you may Wikipedia it. Unbelievable. My gut is some Italian who secretly enjoys Greek food founded this place (the audacity, first you steal their beliefs, then you steal their food…I just hope they didn’t steal Moussaka – that stuff is terrible).
So we decide to go to Greek Islands. Here’s the thing, I love all of greektown for this one nuance – free valet. Honestly, I’m going to be spending a lot of money at your place, most likely, the least you can do is give me free valet or make it breakeven ($2.25 a head each way to commute via train means valet should be 10 bucks – now I’m willing to pay up for the service, so $12-$14 is about what I consider breakeven valet price).
We’ve got a large party, 8 folks, so we get there and tell the maître de that we’re here and our party is moments away. He tells us to notify him when the party gets here. Fine, whatever, I’ll indulge your desire to make me wait longer for saganaki. The party gets there, as I promised, mere moments later, at which point I inform the maître de that we’re all here. The waiting begins. The fucking waiting begins. Not a good way to start off the evening. We were promised it would take 20 minutes. It took 1h10m. LIVID, that’s what I was. It’s fine that it will take that long, JUST TELL ME. I’m at the bar sweating like a mad man because I guess the owners wanted to replicate Greek’s summer heat in Chicago.
We finally sit ourselves and the group is famished and without further ado (read: without reading the menu) we just start ordering stuff for appetizers. Well out comes the bread (5 minutes later). Ugh, the bread. And UGH, the butter. I’ve spoken about this many times, SHAKE IT UP, serve me good bread, or good butter, or preferably both. Granted they also served olive oil, but it was a little too standard for me. The bread was a regular bread loaf with sesame seeds on it and the butter was the kind you get in the small package that you need to tear off the plastic film. It’s a Greek restaurant, please, please, please give me some sweet Churek. Thumbs DOWN.
Some of the appetizers start arriving, we’ve got a mix of stuff including: Gryos (better than expected, not the frozen crap), Saganaki (surprisingly GI has among the best Saganaki in Chicago), Tzatziki sauce (very good), and a Greek Salad (terrible, wilted lettuce, bad olives). Here’s the thing, we specially ordered some tzatziki and the worst thing possible happens, no pita chips come with the sauce, they expect us to put the sauce on the crap-ass bread they have. Are you kidding me? Get me so pita chips damnit! See, this is something the Mexican restaurants do well, whenever I’ve ordered any type of dip, the chips are in HUGELY abundant supply (just supply would work for greek restaurants), GREEK RESTAURANTS, LEARN FROM THIS.
Ugh, do I have to talk about this? The main courses. There was categorically NOTHING to write home about. Let's start with the fact that we ordered at 7:30 pm on a Saturday night and 3 of the daily specials weren't available. This might be worth knowing as the waiter takes our order. Tsk tsk. Anyways, my wife ordered the Mediterranean Sea bass (it’s only fresher 4700 miles away) – Mediterranean sea bass is bad, it has very little fat to it so it quickly dries out and loses its flavor, much like what happened at GI. I also got some lamb leg slices – those were bad, like really dried out brisket and I love lamb, very disappointing. We had another person get the meat pie. Not bad, the meat was flavorful, but there was surprisingly no basting sauce that was used. That’s surprising both good and bad. Good because the meat was still flavorful, bad because in a meat pie you usually want the pie aspect to soak up the sauce as well that way if you’re left with a bite without the meat you can still taste the juices. Someone else ordered the…ah, whatever, not even worth mentioning. I’m just gonna cut to the chase.
BREAD = 3. APPETIZERS = 6.5 (it was the saganaki and gyro that made it palatable), entrees = 4.5-6. Valet = 10.
Total Meal + Experience…drum roll. 4.5-5.5. I know, why so low? Well, all-in-all it was as expected with some kinda low hits and kinda high hits. Nothing special.
Monday, February 15, 2010
MK (Chicago)
Ah, Valentine's Day. The day of...chocolate?...cards?...gold pagodas with fresh water pearls (http://www.neimanmarcus.com/store/catalog/prod.jhtml?itemId=prod35730304&parentId=cat16130831&masterId=cat16130736&index=8&cmCat=cat000000cat000553cat17640731cat16130736cat16130831)?
I guess so.
Originally, the wife and I weren't going to go out - she'd been feeling very under the weather for about 2 weeks (so sick that she hampered child making practice). But fortunately, she was feeling a little bit better - her nose was now pink and not too red - and she got us a reservation for 8.30 at MK. I don't know if we enjoyed it as much as we could, I still had work to do when we got back and she had to study for class, but we tried our best.
Ah, we arrive there and got valet parking. Valet parking is key in a large city. I'd much rather drive someplace than wait for a train in the cold. The key here, dear restaurants, is to charge a MODEST price for valet, so much so that the valet price is really convenience. My wife and I travleing via train would have cost a total of around $8. The convenience for valet is no more than 3 dollars. So, 11 bucks is kinda my limit. MK charged 10. Kudos.
We enter and they take our jackets, not much eye candy (sans my wife, of course) around, maybe this place isn't the hot spot Yelp is telling us about.
We sit down at the far end of the restuarant and it's nice and warm. Though 10 minutes later, for the rest of the evening, there's some sort of draft that making us a tad chilly. We soldier on.
Due to our impending work, we only get one drink, a white wine Riesling. Wow, it was delicious, very crisp, well chilled. Mmmm, tasty, and I'm not really a wine connosieur.
An amuse bouche comes out, very tasty - 'twas salmon with creme fresche on a heart shaped biscuit. It was good, very amuse bouche like, got my appetite rearing. Anyways, we order and start our wait. Now there's something a little odd. We've been waiting for about 10 minutes and we have a bread plate and no bread! Well, the bread comes out. Clearly someone reads my blog. There were different types of bread with varying textures. The butter, however, was TAD too cool, but after a few moments or so, it was still spreadable. MK, fix that, make it spreadable immediately.
Our appetizers were Foie Gras and Fetuccini with wild mushrooms. The fetuccini was not particularly great, quite honestly. It was a tad "overproduced," a little oily, not entirely fresh pasta, and the sauce wasn't nearly as creamy as I was anticipating. Though the mushrooms it had were good. The Foie Gras was good. Not the best. I believe the best foie gras I've ever had was in Sarasota FL (I don't remember the name of the restaurant). It had a very light meaty aroma and was super rich, and the date reduction was a fantastic flavor. I'd give the appetizers a 7-8
We then waiting a bit more and nothing. Apparently something happened to our food and a waiter came to our table to apologize. I like the way they apologized. They gave us free food - a carrot soup for us to share. The carrot soup was good, the presentation was very traditional nouveou cuisine - a bowl with a little something in the middle and then the waiter pours the soup into the bowl. 6.5-7.5
Out come our main courses. I had the Venison while my wife had the skirt steak. We both had it medium. Oh boy, was it medium. That is some terrific cooking. Take note L'Oricio. My venison was good, very strong pepper flavor, though the chocolate sauce (or mole as they call it in latin cooking) didn't really speak much of anything to me. But boy, was this meal cooked well. My wife's skirt steak was also cooked VERY well. I found the flavors bold, but thought the outside was TAD charred, adding an uncharacteristic burned flavor to meat.
The meal was accompanied by truffle oil pomme frites with aioli. The presentation was interest - a big old drinking glass with wax paper and stuffed with the fries. I wasn't wowed. At all. The fries were rather too well cooked, a surprising mix of soggy and burnt, weird, I know. My guess is the kitchen used the double fry method (essentially you cook the fries twice, once to cook them, the second time to color them - I don't have the time to explain this technique, read about cooking french fries and you'll understand) and it didn't work successfully. Though, the truffle oil was very nice and the aioli was very rich.
Main course = 7.5-8.5
We didn't get a chance to have dessert as we were both full, but we will be coming back for drinks and dessert. Maybe another review?
total Grade: 8-8.5
Good eats
I guess so.
Originally, the wife and I weren't going to go out - she'd been feeling very under the weather for about 2 weeks (so sick that she hampered child making practice). But fortunately, she was feeling a little bit better - her nose was now pink and not too red - and she got us a reservation for 8.30 at MK. I don't know if we enjoyed it as much as we could, I still had work to do when we got back and she had to study for class, but we tried our best.
Ah, we arrive there and got valet parking. Valet parking is key in a large city. I'd much rather drive someplace than wait for a train in the cold. The key here, dear restaurants, is to charge a MODEST price for valet, so much so that the valet price is really convenience. My wife and I travleing via train would have cost a total of around $8. The convenience for valet is no more than 3 dollars. So, 11 bucks is kinda my limit. MK charged 10. Kudos.
We enter and they take our jackets, not much eye candy (sans my wife, of course) around, maybe this place isn't the hot spot Yelp is telling us about.
We sit down at the far end of the restuarant and it's nice and warm. Though 10 minutes later, for the rest of the evening, there's some sort of draft that making us a tad chilly. We soldier on.
Due to our impending work, we only get one drink, a white wine Riesling. Wow, it was delicious, very crisp, well chilled. Mmmm, tasty, and I'm not really a wine connosieur.
An amuse bouche comes out, very tasty - 'twas salmon with creme fresche on a heart shaped biscuit. It was good, very amuse bouche like, got my appetite rearing. Anyways, we order and start our wait. Now there's something a little odd. We've been waiting for about 10 minutes and we have a bread plate and no bread! Well, the bread comes out. Clearly someone reads my blog. There were different types of bread with varying textures. The butter, however, was TAD too cool, but after a few moments or so, it was still spreadable. MK, fix that, make it spreadable immediately.
Our appetizers were Foie Gras and Fetuccini with wild mushrooms. The fetuccini was not particularly great, quite honestly. It was a tad "overproduced," a little oily, not entirely fresh pasta, and the sauce wasn't nearly as creamy as I was anticipating. Though the mushrooms it had were good. The Foie Gras was good. Not the best. I believe the best foie gras I've ever had was in Sarasota FL (I don't remember the name of the restaurant). It had a very light meaty aroma and was super rich, and the date reduction was a fantastic flavor. I'd give the appetizers a 7-8
We then waiting a bit more and nothing. Apparently something happened to our food and a waiter came to our table to apologize. I like the way they apologized. They gave us free food - a carrot soup for us to share. The carrot soup was good, the presentation was very traditional nouveou cuisine - a bowl with a little something in the middle and then the waiter pours the soup into the bowl. 6.5-7.5
Out come our main courses. I had the Venison while my wife had the skirt steak. We both had it medium. Oh boy, was it medium. That is some terrific cooking. Take note L'Oricio. My venison was good, very strong pepper flavor, though the chocolate sauce (or mole as they call it in latin cooking) didn't really speak much of anything to me. But boy, was this meal cooked well. My wife's skirt steak was also cooked VERY well. I found the flavors bold, but thought the outside was TAD charred, adding an uncharacteristic burned flavor to meat.
The meal was accompanied by truffle oil pomme frites with aioli. The presentation was interest - a big old drinking glass with wax paper and stuffed with the fries. I wasn't wowed. At all. The fries were rather too well cooked, a surprising mix of soggy and burnt, weird, I know. My guess is the kitchen used the double fry method (essentially you cook the fries twice, once to cook them, the second time to color them - I don't have the time to explain this technique, read about cooking french fries and you'll understand) and it didn't work successfully. Though, the truffle oil was very nice and the aioli was very rich.
Main course = 7.5-8.5
We didn't get a chance to have dessert as we were both full, but we will be coming back for drinks and dessert. Maybe another review?
total Grade: 8-8.5
Good eats
Saturday, February 6, 2010
L'Oricio - New Haven, CT
L’Oricio – New Haven, CT
I was rolling off my current engagement and the colleagues at my company had a “rolling-off” good bye dinner for me. I had two options to choose from, L’Oricio and Zinc, both in New Haven.
Having already been to Zinc (fairly good though some definite miscues), I chose L’Oricio.
When I first walked in, it was nice, there were actually people there, unlike at Pacifico.
They didn’t have much to offer in terms of beer, which was disappointing, but a colleague of mine and I ordered a bass. Wow, it was awesome when it came out. Ice cold. That is something that should never be looked past. For me, all cold drinks should be on the very precipice between frozen and liquid state – I’m talking 4 degrees celcius (where water actually starts to expand because it doesn’t know whether to be in liquid or solid state). So, the Bass was amongst the most delicious beers I’ve had – I know it’s a bass so I can’t rate it too highly, but the ice cold temperature made me think I would be in for some treats that evening.
I decided to be adventurous that day and instead of getting a boring salad, I ordered myself the Sardines stuffed with bread crumbs and pan fried in EVOO (frying it in EVOO I thought would be weird, but I gave it a go), a spicy Bucatini all’Amatriciana, and a filet mignon in cream sauce. How did I get three things you ask, am I an over-eater? No, I’m not. I was very happy when the menu said that one could order half size entrees of the pastas, so I decided to do that. I think having a meal with more courses is a terrific way to indulge in the taste of chef, it’s more difficult to hit a home-run, but one gets a better indication of the success and weaknesses of the chef.
Do not be alarmed, my minions, there will be negativity in this report.
Before the food came out, the true test of the restaurant was upon us. The bread and butter portion. How do some many restaurants manage to get this wrong!? Do the owners or chefs, or waiters NEVER eat out? There’s one rule and a few pointers to the bread and butter act: 1)Do not have cold butter, it makes it darned near impossible to spread the butter often leaving the patrons with portions of the bread that have too much and too little butter on it! 2) To improve the experience, have a variety of breads – sometimes I’m in the mood for a roll, sometimes a flatbread, shake up the texture waiter! 3) if you want to wow me with the portion either bring out warm bread (not room temperature) or have the butter in a little dish.
Moving on, the first course comes out and lo-and-behold, my sardines have arrived. Presentation was ok, nothing particularly resplendent – it was three sardines surrounding a small mesclun salad. I ate into the first sardine with unabashed fervor, not because I was hungry but rather because I was anxious to have sardines that didn’t come from a can. Well, they were “eh”. Not bad, but not great either. The flavor was lacking. I don’t know what it is with New Haven, but there are some restaurants that cook their food and the end result is flavor, some have an end result of a high temperature, and some are neither particularly warm nor flavorful, what gives!? My supertaster taste buds will tell you the Sardines were not salty enough and I couldn’t taste the lemon on the sardines. Sardines 4.5-5
Other appetizers included a salami and roasted red peppers on grilled bread. The salami was kind of like what you get at the supermarket deli counter, I won’t even talk about it. The red peppers...well, the peppers were good but the bread was a disappointment. Why disappointing you ask, was it flavor, texture, look, what? It was the look and the temperature. The damned bread had grill marks on it and it wasn’t even hot. That’s like blatantly lying to me. I’m going to figure it out, if I don’t eat the bread I will at least touch it to see how hot it is. Honestly, don’t try fooling me L’Oricio.
Antipasti aside, here comes Nostri Primi – my pasta. Wow, this was good. It took a while for the heat to set in, it wasn’t too hot, but it had a bit of a kick, which is always welcomed. The meal had a good earthy flavor with rich pancetta and onions. This was a hit. I even had the group taste it after I was done. They all liked it. I would give it, individually a 6.5-7.5
Now I was excited again for my main course, the filet.
And out it comes. Thusly, disappointment sets in. “Where’s the steak”, I mutter to myself. It was sinking underneath the cream. Figuratively sinking and drowning. To make matters worse, mine was amongst the first that came out, so I had to wait while everyone else got their meals. This is bad because while it waits, under the hot cream, it’s actually continuing to cook from the residual heat of the rest of the meat.
Then I cut it open. Oh FUCK! Now I’m pissed. This is garbage. I ordered it medium. I wanted to see some pink or if I was lucky a little bit of red. What I got was medium well to well done. See the link = http://www.goodcooking.com/steak/doneness.htm . You’ll notice the difference between medium and medium well. Well damnit, I got medium well.
So I suck it up and continue to indulge, scratch that, I continue to eat what’s on my plate. It honestly felt like I had ordered heavy cream with a sprinkling of meat. I could barely eat it the taste was so overwhelmingly creamy and the cream covered the steak. It wasn’t even like it was dark cream, no. It truly was white-as-day heavy cream that covered my meal.
We then got dessert, which was ok, nothing special. Ooh, a brownie cake (what am I five years old?) with coffee ice-cream or something equally as cliché.
Overall, be careful what you get from this place.
Overall experience 6-6.5 (the bucatini is what set this meal apart)
I was rolling off my current engagement and the colleagues at my company had a “rolling-off” good bye dinner for me. I had two options to choose from, L’Oricio and Zinc, both in New Haven.
Having already been to Zinc (fairly good though some definite miscues), I chose L’Oricio.
When I first walked in, it was nice, there were actually people there, unlike at Pacifico.
They didn’t have much to offer in terms of beer, which was disappointing, but a colleague of mine and I ordered a bass. Wow, it was awesome when it came out. Ice cold. That is something that should never be looked past. For me, all cold drinks should be on the very precipice between frozen and liquid state – I’m talking 4 degrees celcius (where water actually starts to expand because it doesn’t know whether to be in liquid or solid state). So, the Bass was amongst the most delicious beers I’ve had – I know it’s a bass so I can’t rate it too highly, but the ice cold temperature made me think I would be in for some treats that evening.
I decided to be adventurous that day and instead of getting a boring salad, I ordered myself the Sardines stuffed with bread crumbs and pan fried in EVOO (frying it in EVOO I thought would be weird, but I gave it a go), a spicy Bucatini all’Amatriciana, and a filet mignon in cream sauce. How did I get three things you ask, am I an over-eater? No, I’m not. I was very happy when the menu said that one could order half size entrees of the pastas, so I decided to do that. I think having a meal with more courses is a terrific way to indulge in the taste of chef, it’s more difficult to hit a home-run, but one gets a better indication of the success and weaknesses of the chef.
Do not be alarmed, my minions, there will be negativity in this report.
Before the food came out, the true test of the restaurant was upon us. The bread and butter portion. How do some many restaurants manage to get this wrong!? Do the owners or chefs, or waiters NEVER eat out? There’s one rule and a few pointers to the bread and butter act: 1)Do not have cold butter, it makes it darned near impossible to spread the butter often leaving the patrons with portions of the bread that have too much and too little butter on it! 2) To improve the experience, have a variety of breads – sometimes I’m in the mood for a roll, sometimes a flatbread, shake up the texture waiter! 3) if you want to wow me with the portion either bring out warm bread (not room temperature) or have the butter in a little dish.
Moving on, the first course comes out and lo-and-behold, my sardines have arrived. Presentation was ok, nothing particularly resplendent – it was three sardines surrounding a small mesclun salad. I ate into the first sardine with unabashed fervor, not because I was hungry but rather because I was anxious to have sardines that didn’t come from a can. Well, they were “eh”. Not bad, but not great either. The flavor was lacking. I don’t know what it is with New Haven, but there are some restaurants that cook their food and the end result is flavor, some have an end result of a high temperature, and some are neither particularly warm nor flavorful, what gives!? My supertaster taste buds will tell you the Sardines were not salty enough and I couldn’t taste the lemon on the sardines. Sardines 4.5-5
Other appetizers included a salami and roasted red peppers on grilled bread. The salami was kind of like what you get at the supermarket deli counter, I won’t even talk about it. The red peppers...well, the peppers were good but the bread was a disappointment. Why disappointing you ask, was it flavor, texture, look, what? It was the look and the temperature. The damned bread had grill marks on it and it wasn’t even hot. That’s like blatantly lying to me. I’m going to figure it out, if I don’t eat the bread I will at least touch it to see how hot it is. Honestly, don’t try fooling me L’Oricio.
Antipasti aside, here comes Nostri Primi – my pasta. Wow, this was good. It took a while for the heat to set in, it wasn’t too hot, but it had a bit of a kick, which is always welcomed. The meal had a good earthy flavor with rich pancetta and onions. This was a hit. I even had the group taste it after I was done. They all liked it. I would give it, individually a 6.5-7.5
Now I was excited again for my main course, the filet.
And out it comes. Thusly, disappointment sets in. “Where’s the steak”, I mutter to myself. It was sinking underneath the cream. Figuratively sinking and drowning. To make matters worse, mine was amongst the first that came out, so I had to wait while everyone else got their meals. This is bad because while it waits, under the hot cream, it’s actually continuing to cook from the residual heat of the rest of the meat.
Then I cut it open. Oh FUCK! Now I’m pissed. This is garbage. I ordered it medium. I wanted to see some pink or if I was lucky a little bit of red. What I got was medium well to well done. See the link = http://www.goodcooking.com/steak/doneness.htm . You’ll notice the difference between medium and medium well. Well damnit, I got medium well.
So I suck it up and continue to indulge, scratch that, I continue to eat what’s on my plate. It honestly felt like I had ordered heavy cream with a sprinkling of meat. I could barely eat it the taste was so overwhelmingly creamy and the cream covered the steak. It wasn’t even like it was dark cream, no. It truly was white-as-day heavy cream that covered my meal.
We then got dessert, which was ok, nothing special. Ooh, a brownie cake (what am I five years old?) with coffee ice-cream or something equally as cliché.
Overall, be careful what you get from this place.
Overall experience 6-6.5 (the bucatini is what set this meal apart)
Friday, February 5, 2010
Pacifico - New Haven, CT
Pacifico in New Haven, CT - one of two restaurants I visited this past week, here's the review:
The evening started off a bit strange, a Monday night in New Haven, CT (Yale), but the place looked deserted. In fact, one of my compatriots even asked whether the place was open, it looked very dark from the outside.
Anyways, we entered the place and it was fairly empty - but have no fear, management did not anticipate that at all (they even made it two stories!). Fairly empty also mean practically no one at the bar (I counted one person, I don't know if that includes the bartender). So we walk upstairs and have a seat at our table for 10. The wait staff was kind and we began our orders.
I'm no wine connoisseur, but Marcelo from Epicurean Musings is. He placed an order for a fruity non-Chardonnay, and what do they bring, well, I'm actually not going to answer that, you know the purpose of this blog is to speak the truth, right?
So we end up ordering some appetizers for the table: fresh Oysters, spicy Guacamole, Beef Empanadas, and Lobster Quesadillas.
The Oysters were a hit, for me at least, and especially when combine with their red sauce - I didn't get to ask what it was. The Empanadas were also good, though I felt the beef lacked a little bit of flavor - Pacifico probably thought they were high class and could use "premium beef"....that usually means no fat, which in turns means limited taste. But, it was still "ok".
Then there was the guacamole. Ugh. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't as delivered (soon to be a recurring theme here). Spiciness was no where close to the taste of the guac, it was rather bland. In fact, the bottled water I'm drinking now has more spiciness than the guac!!
Then there was the Lobster Quesadilla. It wasn't as bad as the Guac, but it was too cheesy and creamy, and (of all things) too much guacamole. I don't abhor these things per se, but the level of those accoutrements made me think they were trying to compensate for something. They were. The lack of lobster. The quality of lobster was good, but it wasn't there in quantity. I guess that's a typical trick the restaurant biz does. "Let's fool them with the limited amount of specialty in the dish and add more cheap stuff". I can't be fooled with that.
Drinks and appetizers = 5-6.5
I then ordered the Chilean Sea Bass. Originally it was supposed to be a full fish, but I requested them to filet it and pan fry.
Admittedly, I'm not a chef, but I do cook a lot, and fatty white fish is something I'm pretty good at (you'll get the point in a minute).
I got my perfectly filleted fish with a goat cheese salad on the side of the plate (rather odd, I would have probably placed the fish on the salad, not have a side of salad). I then looked at the food more carefully. Both myself and Marcelo, who on my right, got the sea bass. Something looked awfully weird. It was PERFECTLY filleted. I mean perfectly. How does that happen on both of them. There were no tears or other signs of manual knife skills in place. How could Pacifico afford should a good chef (or sous chef) when no one even comes to the place on a Monday (and also when the food isn't that good, really...read on). I don't think it was ever a whole fish, they just plan on most people asking for it filleted (I wouldn't call myself a conspiracy theorist, but more like a realist).
The salad was good, not too oily, the goat cheese was beautifully warm and blended with the greens quite nicely.
But, ugh...the sea bass. Really? Super bland. There was no taste to the fish, which is surprising given how fatty a meat it is. In fact, the rub the put on the fish and oils in which they cooked it made the Sea bass taste almost like vegetable oil. Practically no taste. I further checked my senses when I proceeded to the extremes of the fish, where there was more skin and less meat. I would have expected a stronger showing of flavor there due to the amount of time and soaking the skin would have compared to the meat.
Ugh. Quite frankly, I can't even talk about this anymore it was so disappointing.
In fact, I think it was so bad, not one person in the group of 10 even got dessert.
So my rating, you ask? Appetizers: 5-6, Main Course 4.5-5.5, Service, 5.
Total Rating: 5-5.5
Good eatings all
The evening started off a bit strange, a Monday night in New Haven, CT (Yale), but the place looked deserted. In fact, one of my compatriots even asked whether the place was open, it looked very dark from the outside.
Anyways, we entered the place and it was fairly empty - but have no fear, management did not anticipate that at all (they even made it two stories!). Fairly empty also mean practically no one at the bar (I counted one person, I don't know if that includes the bartender). So we walk upstairs and have a seat at our table for 10. The wait staff was kind and we began our orders.
I'm no wine connoisseur, but Marcelo from Epicurean Musings is. He placed an order for a fruity non-Chardonnay, and what do they bring, well, I'm actually not going to answer that, you know the purpose of this blog is to speak the truth, right?
So we end up ordering some appetizers for the table: fresh Oysters, spicy Guacamole, Beef Empanadas, and Lobster Quesadillas.
The Oysters were a hit, for me at least, and especially when combine with their red sauce - I didn't get to ask what it was. The Empanadas were also good, though I felt the beef lacked a little bit of flavor - Pacifico probably thought they were high class and could use "premium beef"....that usually means no fat, which in turns means limited taste. But, it was still "ok".
Then there was the guacamole. Ugh. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't as delivered (soon to be a recurring theme here). Spiciness was no where close to the taste of the guac, it was rather bland. In fact, the bottled water I'm drinking now has more spiciness than the guac!!
Then there was the Lobster Quesadilla. It wasn't as bad as the Guac, but it was too cheesy and creamy, and (of all things) too much guacamole. I don't abhor these things per se, but the level of those accoutrements made me think they were trying to compensate for something. They were. The lack of lobster. The quality of lobster was good, but it wasn't there in quantity. I guess that's a typical trick the restaurant biz does. "Let's fool them with the limited amount of specialty in the dish and add more cheap stuff". I can't be fooled with that.
Drinks and appetizers = 5-6.5
I then ordered the Chilean Sea Bass. Originally it was supposed to be a full fish, but I requested them to filet it and pan fry.
Admittedly, I'm not a chef, but I do cook a lot, and fatty white fish is something I'm pretty good at (you'll get the point in a minute).
I got my perfectly filleted fish with a goat cheese salad on the side of the plate (rather odd, I would have probably placed the fish on the salad, not have a side of salad). I then looked at the food more carefully. Both myself and Marcelo, who on my right, got the sea bass. Something looked awfully weird. It was PERFECTLY filleted. I mean perfectly. How does that happen on both of them. There were no tears or other signs of manual knife skills in place. How could Pacifico afford should a good chef (or sous chef) when no one even comes to the place on a Monday (and also when the food isn't that good, really...read on). I don't think it was ever a whole fish, they just plan on most people asking for it filleted (I wouldn't call myself a conspiracy theorist, but more like a realist).
The salad was good, not too oily, the goat cheese was beautifully warm and blended with the greens quite nicely.
But, ugh...the sea bass. Really? Super bland. There was no taste to the fish, which is surprising given how fatty a meat it is. In fact, the rub the put on the fish and oils in which they cooked it made the Sea bass taste almost like vegetable oil. Practically no taste. I further checked my senses when I proceeded to the extremes of the fish, where there was more skin and less meat. I would have expected a stronger showing of flavor there due to the amount of time and soaking the skin would have compared to the meat.
Ugh. Quite frankly, I can't even talk about this anymore it was so disappointing.
In fact, I think it was so bad, not one person in the group of 10 even got dessert.
So my rating, you ask? Appetizers: 5-6, Main Course 4.5-5.5, Service, 5.
Total Rating: 5-5.5
Good eatings all
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Hop Leaf (Andersonville - Chicago)
Hi all, here is my first posting of a visit to a restaurant.
Marcelo from Epicurean Musings (blogspot) recommended this place for beers, and I took the recommendation and included a review of the food. Anyways...
When I first walked in to this place, I was happy. The beer list was extensive and primarily non-traditional (traditional = Coors, Heineken, Bud, etc), and draft (try the Kwak beer, delicious and cool presentation). The place did look a bit small, but it seemed to separate itself from bar and restaurant very well. I was also glad to note that the place wasn't entirely hipster as I had somewhat expected given my previous jaunts into "Girls-town."
Then....the waiting happened. I hate waiting, especially for a f*ing table on a night where there were 4 couples ahead of us (we waited for about 1h10m). This waiting was not fun, and to compound it, my suffering was exacerbated by seeing the hipster wait staff (they were the only hipsters there) continually fly by me .
So we get seated and the food begins. My wife and I continue our drinking and overall the quality of the beers/drinks deserves a 9.5 (a 10 if they had a more extensive list).
Out comes the Mussels in their preparation of the day (broth = white wine, cream, onions, taragon, bay leaf, lobster flavor, rather standard except for the lobster). The mussels themselves were good, not terrific, but that's an awful difficult task to make mussels good. So, my first complaint you ask? The broth. There just wasn't enough broth in the bowl, the first layer of mussels were swimming in the broth but the other layers of mussels were no where close to the broth (there were around 6 layers of mussels). This upset me. I enjoy eating the mussels and having some sort of broth as I put this in my mouth. My second complaint: the temperature. For crying out loud, send me my hot food HOT. The temperature of the mussels was a bit tepid. Thirdly, the presentation of the food was rather uninspiring...hmmm, how to present mussel, oh I know, in a bowl. Gee thanks chef! However, this is a weird complaint of mine so... Mussels = 7.5 - 8
Ah, the fries. Good, not great. The spicy aioli that came with it was devoured by my wife. As a supertaster myself, though, I thought the aioli was a TAD too mayo-y. The fries were a little too brown as well. So....Fries = 7-8
Lately I've learned to appreciate some pork product (primarily Ribs and Sausage). However, I much prefer lamb (cooked well and NOT lamp chops). Well, the waiter came out and I asked which of the following dishes he recommended MOST (pork belly, goat stew, half duck). I was hoping he'd say the pork belly because on a previous dining experience at Spiaggia (http://www.spiaggiarestaurant.com/) I had gotten the pork belly and it was delicious. Well, here at Hop Leaf, not so much. The pork was dry, way too fatty. The collard greens were ok, but I couldn't even find the pearl onions. Without all the accoutrements, though, the food was bad. Pork Belly = 4.5 - 6
My wife ordered the ham sandwich on sourdough. At first site it looked awesome. The bread looked like french toast. I personally do not like ham, but my wife does, and I think it was a fairly good sandwich, there was gruyere cheese on it with apple slaw. She says it was good, a little bit greasy, but a good mix of sweet and salty, crunchy and creamy. She rates it 7-8
Lastly, the wait service. Well, they were standard, what can I say. When do you ever go to a restaurant and remember an outstanding level of service? Though I often remember crappy service. They were friendly, but hipsters, I'll give them a 5.5 and maybe up to a 6.5 if I didn't hate most things bohemian.
Overall, go here for the beers, not for the food. Experience: 6.5 - 7.5
PLEASE NOTE, I AM A VERY UP-BEAT PERSON, BUT MY PERSONALITY TENDS TO QUICKLY IDENTIFY AND DISCUSS DEFICIENCIES, IF THINGS ARE DONE CORRECTLY, I NEVER MAKE MENTION OF IT, THINGS SHOULD ALWAYS BE PERFECT. ADDITIONALLY, I UNDERSTAND THAT I MAY HAVE MY OWN IDIOSYNCRACIES, AS SUCH I ALWAYS TRY TO GIVE A RANGE FOR THE FOOD DEPENDING UPON WHAT I COULD REASONABLY EXPECT SOMEONE ELSE TO THINK. PLEASE NOTE THAT A RATING OF FIVE IS NORMAL, NEITHER GOOD NOR BAD. THERE IS NO GRADE INFLATION
Marcelo from Epicurean Musings (blogspot) recommended this place for beers, and I took the recommendation and included a review of the food. Anyways...
When I first walked in to this place, I was happy. The beer list was extensive and primarily non-traditional (traditional = Coors, Heineken, Bud, etc), and draft (try the Kwak beer, delicious and cool presentation). The place did look a bit small, but it seemed to separate itself from bar and restaurant very well. I was also glad to note that the place wasn't entirely hipster as I had somewhat expected given my previous jaunts into "Girls-town."
Then....the waiting happened. I hate waiting, especially for a f*ing table on a night where there were 4 couples ahead of us (we waited for about 1h10m). This waiting was not fun, and to compound it, my suffering was exacerbated by seeing the hipster wait staff (they were the only hipsters there) continually fly by me .
So we get seated and the food begins. My wife and I continue our drinking and overall the quality of the beers/drinks deserves a 9.5 (a 10 if they had a more extensive list).
Out comes the Mussels in their preparation of the day (broth = white wine, cream, onions, taragon, bay leaf, lobster flavor, rather standard except for the lobster). The mussels themselves were good, not terrific, but that's an awful difficult task to make mussels good. So, my first complaint you ask? The broth. There just wasn't enough broth in the bowl, the first layer of mussels were swimming in the broth but the other layers of mussels were no where close to the broth (there were around 6 layers of mussels). This upset me. I enjoy eating the mussels and having some sort of broth as I put this in my mouth. My second complaint: the temperature. For crying out loud, send me my hot food HOT. The temperature of the mussels was a bit tepid. Thirdly, the presentation of the food was rather uninspiring...hmmm, how to present mussel, oh I know, in a bowl. Gee thanks chef! However, this is a weird complaint of mine so... Mussels = 7.5 - 8
Ah, the fries. Good, not great. The spicy aioli that came with it was devoured by my wife. As a supertaster myself, though, I thought the aioli was a TAD too mayo-y. The fries were a little too brown as well. So....Fries = 7-8
Lately I've learned to appreciate some pork product (primarily Ribs and Sausage). However, I much prefer lamb (cooked well and NOT lamp chops). Well, the waiter came out and I asked which of the following dishes he recommended MOST (pork belly, goat stew, half duck). I was hoping he'd say the pork belly because on a previous dining experience at Spiaggia (http://www.spiaggiarestaurant.com/) I had gotten the pork belly and it was delicious. Well, here at Hop Leaf, not so much. The pork was dry, way too fatty. The collard greens were ok, but I couldn't even find the pearl onions. Without all the accoutrements, though, the food was bad. Pork Belly = 4.5 - 6
My wife ordered the ham sandwich on sourdough. At first site it looked awesome. The bread looked like french toast. I personally do not like ham, but my wife does, and I think it was a fairly good sandwich, there was gruyere cheese on it with apple slaw. She says it was good, a little bit greasy, but a good mix of sweet and salty, crunchy and creamy. She rates it 7-8
Lastly, the wait service. Well, they were standard, what can I say. When do you ever go to a restaurant and remember an outstanding level of service? Though I often remember crappy service. They were friendly, but hipsters, I'll give them a 5.5 and maybe up to a 6.5 if I didn't hate most things bohemian.
Overall, go here for the beers, not for the food. Experience: 6.5 - 7.5
PLEASE NOTE, I AM A VERY UP-BEAT PERSON, BUT MY PERSONALITY TENDS TO QUICKLY IDENTIFY AND DISCUSS DEFICIENCIES, IF THINGS ARE DONE CORRECTLY, I NEVER MAKE MENTION OF IT, THINGS SHOULD ALWAYS BE PERFECT. ADDITIONALLY, I UNDERSTAND THAT I MAY HAVE MY OWN IDIOSYNCRACIES, AS SUCH I ALWAYS TRY TO GIVE A RANGE FOR THE FOOD DEPENDING UPON WHAT I COULD REASONABLY EXPECT SOMEONE ELSE TO THINK. PLEASE NOTE THAT A RATING OF FIVE IS NORMAL, NEITHER GOOD NOR BAD. THERE IS NO GRADE INFLATION
Friday, January 22, 2010
Welcome
Hi all,
This is my first blog post and I'm looking forward to doing what I set out to - chronicle my exploits with various restaurants around the US.
I am based in Chicago, but for work I travel a lot, including: NYC, North Haven CT, Indianapolis, Thousand Oaks CA, Lousiville.
I will always identify a ranking from 1-10 (10 being the best), the restaurant, the city it was in, I'll even try giving the address.
Let the games begin.
This is my first blog post and I'm looking forward to doing what I set out to - chronicle my exploits with various restaurants around the US.
I am based in Chicago, but for work I travel a lot, including: NYC, North Haven CT, Indianapolis, Thousand Oaks CA, Lousiville.
I will always identify a ranking from 1-10 (10 being the best), the restaurant, the city it was in, I'll even try giving the address.
Let the games begin.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)