Since Cliff and I had an extra night of dining, I made reservations for L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon in the Four Seasons Hotel, one of my last restaurants to cross off the New York Michelin list. The restaurant is one large room with an open kitchen as its centerpiece; I requested seats at the kitchen counter so we could watch the chefs in action:
The menu is quite large and you can order a la carte or do the full tasting. Since I’ve been really maxing out my dining out in the last month of the year, we opted for the a la carte option. After we ordered, our server brought along a bread basket:
Focaccia with onions, French bread, and a French roll. The focaccia was very bland and the French and regular French roll were a little too tough (especially since I just finished a visit to the dentist earlier in the day).
We started with an amouse bouche – the foie gras royale:
The foie gras royale was a foie gras mousse with a port reduction and a Parmesan cheese foam on top. It was an interesting combination because of the port reduction and I really liked it – a great way to redeem themselves from the less than delicious bread basket.
For my appetizer, I ordered the Crispy Langoustine Papillote with Basil Pesto:
And Cliff ordered the Pressed Duck Foie Gras with plums and toasted bread:
The foie gras was decadent, smooth, and very creamy. I loved the plums that were soaked in wine and also liked the toast points (although unlike per se and The French Laundry, they didn’t bring us more toast points so I had to use our regular bread to finish the dish). The langoustine was very lightly breaded and very crispy, although the basil pesto flavor was very muted and the langoustine was improperly seasoned.
Next, we shared the Beef And Foie Gras Burgers with Caramelised Bell Peppers:
The burger:
The burger was pretty hyped up because it’s topped with a sliver of foie gras, but quite frankly, I didn’t taste any of the foie gras (if anything, it was more greasy than a normal burger). Also, the bun was definitely too greasy (broiche is definitely not my bun of choice when it comes to burgers). The fries weren’t that special and tasted a bit like freezer fries and they also had a grown up version of ketchup that I thought wasn’t sweet enough (what can I say, I love Heinz ketchup).
For my main course, I ordered the Sautéed Amadai In A Yuzu Broth with lotus roots:
The skin was separated from the actual fish and I literally couldn’t stop staring at it because it looked so incredibly scaly; the server had to stop by and cajole me to try the skin (I was going to try it, I swear, I was just really hypnotized by the look of the skin). The fish was quite hearty and had a firm texture and the yuzu broth was really the highlight of the dish – even the server thought so!
Cliff ordered the lobster:
We shared both dishes but Cliff liked the lobster more and I enjoyed the amadai more; I thought the lobster was a tad overcooked and nothing special.
Before our desserts arrived, we had a palate cleanser – lychee sorbet with poppy seeds:
We saved room for dessert because we definitely wanted to order La Sphère de Sucre:
The sphere was filled with a very light mousse, fresh blueberries, and sorbet:
It was super fun to break (watch the video here) and also one of the best desserts I’ve had at a Michelin-starred restaurants; it was beautiful, not too sweet, and definitely the most creative dessert I’ve had this year.
We finished with some house made candies:
Cliff and I both enjoyed the meal and I really liked eating at the chef’s counter so we could watch everyone in the kitchen and also converse with the people dining next to us. I thought it was an intimate but lively restaurant and definitely want to return.
To take a break from Michelin dining, I went to Blue Smoke on a Sunday night for a quick bite to eat. I hadn’t really eaten much throughout the day and definitely ordered way too much food and alcohol. We started with Toasted Pork Ravioli “St. Louis Style” smoked tomato sauce:
The toasted pork ravioli was a little overcooked but the smoke tomato sauce was so good that I ate all of the ravioli anyway. Breaded, fried, and lots of tomato sauce – you really can’t go wrong.
I also ordered the Rib Sampler memphis baby backs, kansas city spareribs and texas beef ribs:
And the Pulled Pork on homemade brioche bun with pickles, baked beans, and sesame slaw:
And Sweet Potato Fries with maple dip:
And Macaroni and cheese:
My favorites were definitely the ribs (all of them) and the sweet potato fries. I was a little disappointed with the pulled pork sandwich because I thought the bread was a little too tough, but I did enjoy the actual pork (and Texas Pete’s that I doused on it). The macaroni and cheese was also slightly disappointing because the macaroni was a little overcooked. My date and I started drinking while we were waiting for our table and then decided to do shots during dinner – so much food AND alcohol made for quite an exciting Sunday night!
Last week, Cliff flew in from California to attend a conference at the Time Warner Center. Since he was visiting, we decided to make a reservation at wd-50, a molecular gastronomy restaurant run by Wylie Dufresne. I saved the restaurant for Cliff because we visited another molecular gastronomy restaurant together (we went to Alinea for my birthday). As luck would have it, my brother won four tickets to a Mastercard event featuring a demo by Wylie Dufresne AND food by the chef, so I quickly cancelled the wd-50 reservation and made a reservation at L’atelier de Joel Rubochon. I thought the demo would be at the restaurant, instead, it was at the French Culinary Institute in Soho. I’m contemplating whether or not it was an actual wd-50 experience; on one hand, I didn’t visit the restaurant, but on the other, I ate wd-50 food, met the chef, AND saw a demo of how it was prepared. What do you think? Should I go back to wd-50 before the end of the year, or should I count it as a visit?
We started with peekytoe crab roll, salt ‘n vinegar chips, and celery mayonnaise:
Chef Dufresne didn’t do a demo of how to recreate the peekytoe crab roll, however, he told us that he wanted to recreate something that was very familiar but make it in a way that incorporated interesting and unfamiliar ingredients. The peekytoe crab roll was my least favorite dish of the evening; the crab was too finely separated and even though it was an entire roll of peekytoe crab, it didn’t taste substantial.
For our second course, Chef Dufresne made cold fried chicken with buttermilk ricotta, tobasco, and caviar:
Chef Dufresne was saying how some things are better the second day – fried chicken, pizza, and personally, I think Chipotle burrito bowls are a lot better the second day – his team created the cold fried chicken by pressing all of the dark meat together with meat glue and cooking it sous vide for 6 hours. Here’s the chicken:
The chicken was spruced up with some caviar, had pieces of fried chicken skin, and also had a buttermilk ricotta that added a great tanginess to the dish. Even though it was served cold, it was definitely awesome.
For our third course, we had eggs Benedict, fried hollandaise, and Candian bacon:
And a picture of the hollandaise:
They separate out all of the egg yolks and cook them slowly in a tube that looks like a Flavor-ice holder at a temperature that makes the egg yolk very curd-like and spreadable. Next, the restaurant makes a hollandaise sauce that they freeze, dip in egg again, and fry (egg fried egg!) The result is an incredibly creamy and rich hollandaise with a slice of crispy Canadian bacon, and slightly thick egg yolk. Decadent, but very delicious as well.
The presentation was really interesting – everyone at the restaurant is truly and artist and they continuously tinker with different recipes and come up with crazy ideas. One thing they haven’t been able to do is create hot ice cream (what a way to mess with your mind!)
Here’s me, David, and Laura at the demo:
For dessert, we had grapefruit curd, campari, hibiscus, and sorrel sorbet:
The squiggly ‘s’ is the grapefruit curd and the sorrel sorbet was actually quite refreshing and slightly savory, which was a nice way to complement the slightly tart curd. After the presentation, I spoke with Chef Dufresne and told him about my quest to visit all of the Michelin-starred restaurants before the end of the year:
He said it sounded like an awesome adventure (it is) and that he hoped I came to visit before the end of the year. So, what do you think – should I visit the restaurant before the end of the year or can I count this as a Michelin visit?
A couple weeks ago, I went on a date to Franciscos Centro Vasco because we were in the mood for lobster:
The lobster meat was surprisingly tender for being so large (I’ve heard that the larger the lobster, the tougher the meat). We ordered a five pound broiled lobster with tons of clarified butter, baked potatoes, and a salad to start things off. We ended with a big slice of cheesecake that we split!
