ad hoc

Going back to our Napa updates today and starting with our 4th of July dinner. If you missed the other updates, we ate at Solbar Calistoga and stayed at Chanric Inn in Calistoga as well.

On the 4th of July, we continued doing wine tastings and then went to ad hoc for dinner. In the past, when I’ve gone to ad hoc I’ve always enjoyed the food (see this post),but I’ve never been there for their fried chicken (which is usually served every Monday night). It was our lucky day when we visited because they were serving fried chicken for the 4th of July. I’ve actually made Thomas Keller’s fried chicken (the recipe is in his ad hoc cookbook – see this post) and know how much work is involved in making the fried chicken. We started with the iceberg lettuce salad with fresh herbs, radishes, and carrots from The French Laundry’s garden:

Everything was fresh and crisp; the vegetables were much more flavorful than anything we eat in New York! The entire trip Ken was enjoying himself so much that he was trying to convince me to move to Napa; while I love Napa (the weather alone is reason enough to move), I just can’t detach myself from New York.

The main course, the fried chicken, is served lukewarm:

With a side of corn and watermelon:

We also ordered the mac and cheese, which was cheesy, al dente, and pretty amazing:

There is the option to order an additional dish (even though we were getting full, there was no way we were going to say no!) – this is known as the world’s best sandwich:

The open-faced sandwich is a BLT with an egg on top (and it was used in the movie Spanglish). When I told Ken that Thomas Keller was a consultant on the movie and taught Adam Sandler how to create this sandwich, he texted his friend because they watched the movie (which they didn’t like) but ended up recreating the sandwich because it looked so damn good in the movie.

After our open-faced sandwich, we had a cheese plate with honey and mixed nuts:

And capped off the meal with a mixed berry shortcake:

Ken has visited all of Thomas Keller’s restaurants now and is a fan of all of them just like me! We had a great time at ad hoc and it was a great way to spend the 4th of July. We were even able to see some of the fireworks mid-meal!